The Way She Loves Me
by Myth Highwind
Summary: He was always her favorite, but time and tragedy have robbed him of his light. Lucky for Prompto, Cindy loves fixing broken things. (Post game, fluff, angst)
1. Chapter 1

Note: contains mild episode Prompto spoilers and mentions of child abuse in later chapters.

* * *

1.

* * *

Cindy's getting ready for bed when he shows up at the Hammerhead, battered and bloody. He's too thin, his face is sunburned, and his lips are broken and chapped. Worst of all, is the wild, fractured look in his eye.

It's been a while since she last saw him, and time has not been kind. She once adored him for his sweet disposition and bright smile. After all, who could resist someone so full of life and laughter? He was always her favorite for that reason alone, but the sorrowful, pitiful man sitting in the middle of her garage is not that vivacious boy anymore.

She heard the news three months ago and cried for a whole week. She never thought she'd see any of the others again, but here he is, trembling like a kicked dog with his rifle clutched to his chest like it's the only thing that will save him from drowning.

"Prompto?"

"I didn't know where else to go," he says and his voice is raw and hoarse. "I'm sorry."

Cindy drops to her knees on the floor and takes his dirty, bruised face in her hands. His lips tremble and he makes a sound that hurts her all the way to her bones.

"I'm so sorry, sweetie," she says.

She can't tell him it will be okay, because it won't. Not right now and maybe not ever. It isn't right to lie and Cindy knows well what loss can do to a person.

"Why don't you come inside, get cleaned up," she says. "Maybe get you somethin' to eat."

He nods and Cindy helps him to his feet. His steps are slow and pained, and Cindy can see why.

"You're a bone rack," she says. "How long you been walkin'?"

"A while."

* * *

For three days, he doesn't leave Cindy's couch. She begins to worry that he won't come back. She's so worried, it distracts her from her work. When she smashes and breaks three of the fingers on her right hand, she splints her hand and closes the garage for the day.

She returns to her house and roots through the kitchen pantry for a potion. She finds one on the shelf in the back and sits at the counter to unwrap the bindings. From the couch, Prompto watches from a nest of blankets, his haunted eyes lucid for the first time since he showed up.

"Nothin' to worry yourself over," she promises.

He sits up with a quiet grunt of pain and holds out a hand.

"You're hurt."

"Broke a few bones," she says. "No big deal."

"Please," he says and beckons her to him.

She isn't so injured she can't tend to her own wounds, but she senses this is something he wants to do for her. Not because he thinks she's weak, but because he needs to feel like his efforts are worth something.

It couldn't be more plain. It's written all over his face.

His hands are gentle as he finishes unbinding the splints and his expression darkens when he sees the bruised, swollen digits. He doesn't talk as he works, and he won't look her in the eye, but his ministrations bring relief, and the bones set and heal, and all that's left is a bit of stiffness in the joints.

He hasn't bathed since the night he got here. His hair is matted and greasy and his sunburned cheeks peel.

"Startin' to smell a little ripe there, Mister," she says lightly. "How about a long, hot soak in the bath? Maybe a change of clothes?"

She has to help him to the bathroom, and she runs the water while he strips off his dirty shirt. She adds some bubbles, just for fun, then leaves him to get clean on his own.

"Throw your stuff out and I'll give it a wash," she says on her way out. "My bathrobe's on the back of the door."

She starts a load of laundry, then goes to the garage and finds a clean pair of coveralls that'll fit for the time being. He doesn't have much but the clothes he came in.

Back in the kitchen, she makes sandwiches and coffee. By the time the pot finishes brewing, a sweet-scented Prompto emerges from the bath, wrapped in her chocobo yellow bathrobe.

Her laughter makes him blush.

* * *

Prompto can't focus on any one thought for long. They all eventually lead back to Noctis, to Luna, whom he never got the chance to properly thank, and to the what they gave up to spare the world from darkness.

Luna, who steered him to Noctis. Noctis, who accepted his friendship without question, his first and best friend.

It hurts too much.

Before Noctis, Prompto never had anything to call his own. To have that ripped away, it's more than he can handle, even after so long an absence, because even in his absence, there was still hope.

That hope is gone now, and he isn't sure he can move on. He isn't sure he'll ever be okay.

He isn't sure why he's here. He walked for days and weeks and months without thought, surviving on instinct without a plan. Maybe to prove that he could, maybe with a subconscious desire to be killed by something he couldn't fell on his own.

Now, he sits across from a woman he fell head over heels for when he was more naïve and innocent.

She's kind, understanding, and she doesn't ask questions he's not ready to answer. If he isn't careful, he might fall for her again.

His heart is too broken and battered to take that risk. After all, loving someone gave them the power to hurt you, and Prompto has been hurt enough.

* * *

Prompto's been here a week now, and Cindy begins to wonder just how bad off he is. He gets up on his own now, around dawn, and disappears into the desert for the better part of the day. When he returns, he's covered in dust and monster blood, and sometimes comes back with sacks full of loot and cooking ingredients.

It's another two weeks before she understands what he's doing.

She follows him out one morning and finds him at a nearby campsite. The sun's barely up but he's already covered in dirt, and there's a deep scratch on his arm. He peers at her from the ledge above, his chin against his arms that are folded over his knees. He's not angry, just lost.

At the top, she joins him and takes in the view. She doesn't expect him to volunteer information, and is content to sit with him for as long as he'll allow it.

"This is the first place we ever camped," he says after a while.

"Bet that was fun," she said. "Bunch of city boys roughin' it out here in the wild."

"I thought so," he says. "Exciting, you know? Being with friends. On an adventure. We thought we were invincible."

His eyes take on that distant, haunted look again.

"I wish it was still that easy," he says. "The only thing we had to worry about was Noct sleeping through it all and making sure he ate something besides junk food."

Cindy wishes she could make that look go away. His wounds are still raw, still bleeding, and they're not the kind that a potion can heal.

"Guess I thought coming here would help," he says. "You know, to remember the good stuff instead of the bad."

"Did it?"

"It just makes me miss him more."

"You might always miss him," Cindy says. "It ain't easy, lettin' go."

He glances at her and then drops his chin against his arms again.

"Does it ever stop hurting?" he wonders.

"No," she says. "It just hurts less after a spell."

A hot breeze sweeps across the plain and Cindy watches a dirt tornado form and then disappear in a cloud of dust. There and then gone. Like a lot of people she's known.

"I guess I should be moving on soon," he says. "Can't sleep on your couch forever."

She doesn't want him to leave. Not yet. Not in this sad and broken state. Not while she's sure if he goes, he'll find himself outmatched out there on the plain, whether by accident or design.

"You most certainly can," she says. "For as long as you need it."

"I don't want to be in your way," he says.

"You ain't, sweetie," she says. "You ain't."

* * *

He stops going out to the desert unless he's picked up a hunting job. Most days, he helps Cindy at the garage and tries to shut out the barrage of memories that plague him.

They settle into a comfortable routine. Sometimes, they play cards after dinner or sit outside and watch the stars. She comforts him whether he wants it or not on the days he's not okay, and soothes him back to sleep when he wakes from nightmares. Sometimes, she even sings him lullabies, something no one has ever done for him before.

Before he knows it, he's been at the Hammerhead for a year and he's left permanent dents in Cindy's couch. They make him think about moving on again, but all he can picture is an endless string of motel rooms and lonely nights without a friendly voice to chase away the darkness.

"You don't take pictures anymore," she says one afternoon.

There's grease on her cheek and a screwdriver in her hand, and Prompto's sure she's still the most gorgeous creature he's ever laid eyes on.

He can't remember the last picture he took. He doesn't even remember what happened to his old camera, or the photos from their journey. All he knows, is memories are too painful to document anymore.

"Shame," she says. "You were real good at it."

He forgets about this conversation until his birthday, when Cindy presents him with a brand new camera and a case to go with it. It leaves him speechless and near tears. All he can do is nod at her and fall in love all over again.

Cindy, barefoot in a pale blue sundress, her hair free of her trucker cap, is the first picture he takes in far too long.


	2. Chapter 2

2.

* * *

Prompto's just finished up a hunt when he spies something deep red and shiny among the rocks. He bends down, picks it up, and brushes it clean of dust.

It's a bracelet, set with garnet stones. The clasp is broken and the soft gold is scratched all to hell, but it looks familiar. He turns it over and frowns at the familiar maker's mark.

Dino.

He thinks of that first visit to Galdin Quay. Prompto was happy enough to take pictures of palm trees and seagulls and watch girls through the lens of the camera. If Noctis had his way, they wouldn't have done anything but fish for days.

Everything he comes across reminds him of Noctis. There's no escape from what's missing.

There was no other choice for Noctis to make, but that doesn't take the sting out of the loss, even a year and a half later.

Sometimes Prompto wonders if it wouldn't have been better if he stayed that chubby, lonely kid. Better that they never met. Better that Prompto never knew the truth. For as bad as it was back then, this emptiness is a thousand times worse.

Sometimes he's reminded that on the inside, he's still that boy, and he's less sure if the Prompto the others think they knew was only an illusion. Someone he pretended to be. Maybe he got so good at faking it, he believed his own charade. It's hard to tell anymore.

Prompto grips the bracelet in his fist and hurls it back into the desert, desperate to be free of the memories, of all these reminders of the past. The second it's gone from his grasp, he regrets his choice.

He searches the dry earth and shrubs with a burning, sickening desperation. He doesn't need the bracelet, but he isn't ready to let go. Not yet. Not _yet_. He can't force himself to let go yet, but the bracelet is gone, and there's no sign of it anywhere.

He returns to the Hammerhead, and he's out back when Cindy's raised voice carries through the closed office door.

"That ain't the price we agreed on," Cindy says, "and like I told you, I expect payment in full or the car stays here."

"Listen here, you little bitch -"

Prompto bursts in, his gun drawn, to find a customer, twice Cindy's size, with his big hand wrapped around her upper arm.

"Get your hands off of her," Prompto says and he aims at the man's head.

"Mind your own business," the man says. "This don't concern you."

Prompto fires a warning shot. His bullet punches through drywall and tin and the man jumps in surprise and releases his grip on Cindy's arm. All Prompto can see are the red marks on her skin.

Cindy clobbers the customer in the face with a wrench. It busts open his nose, and he goes down as Prompto moves closer, his finger wrapped around the trigger, ready to fire again.

There's a little blood on Cindy's lip. The customer must've hit her. She hit him back, but he _hit_ the Goddess of the Gears, and it takes everything Prompto has in him to keep from blowing the man's brains out.

"Put the gun down, sweetie," Cindy says. "I'm all right. Just put it away now."

Prompto doesn't know what to do, but his ears are ringing and his hands shake and all that buried rage comes boiling up to the surface. He's avoided dealing with so many things, so many infuriating things, and has stayed busy so he can't think about them, but there's something about this that sends him into a tailspin.

It isn't right. That men like this keep on living when good men, men like Noctis, are gone.

A year and a half, and he hasn't cried. Now, he wants to scream until his throat bleeds and scratch holes in his skin until he can feel something again.

A year and a half, and he finds himself on his knees in the middle of Cindy's garage, in no better shape than he was when he arrived.

Cindy takes the gun from him and sets it aside. He lets her, but he can't take his eyes off that smear of blood on her lip.

* * *

The sun is setting, and Prompto still hasn't quite recovered. The customer wasn't the first asshole to ever darken Cindy's doorstep or give her a hard time, and he won't be the last, but Cindy can handle men like that. They're predictable. They all want the same thing, and they all wind up on the floor of her garage with a headache and a healthy fear of crossing her.

Prompto is calm but quiet, and his gaze is fixed on some point far, far away in the night sky when Cindy sits herself atop the picnic table beside him.

She's beginning to suspect this is more than a broken heart, more than grief for a lost friend. There's something deeper and older and even more painful hiding beneath the surface.

"Thinkin' of closing the garage tomorrow," she says. "Got somethin' I need your help with."

That snaps him back to the present and she sees just a flicker of the old Prompto.

"We're not burying that guy's body out in the desert, are we?"

Cindy laughs and pats his knee. "I didn't kill him, jus gave him somethin' to think about."

"Is it a job?"

"Naw," she says. "If I ain't workin', you ain't workin'. I think we both could use a day off."

"It's probably better if I work," Prompto says.

"You avoidin' somethin?"

He rubs his eyes and turns his gaze back to the sky.

"Just easier if I don't have time to think too hard," he says.

"About what?"

He doesn't say anything for a while. This man is a far cry from the gregarious, talkative and excitable boy he was at twenty. There's something broken in him, something lost. If he were a car, Cindy would tear him down to the frame and rebuild him, but people aren't like cars. It isn't always clear what makes 'em tick.

"Doesn't matter what I do," Prompto says. "Or where I go. It all reminds me of him."

"You loved him," Cindy says softly. "Is that it?"

"He was my best friend. Of course I loved him."

"No, I meant-"

"I know what you meant," Prompto says. "It wasn't like that. It's just, he was the first person to really give a damn about me."

His voice goes hoarse and he wipes his eyes with the back of his wrist.

"My family sure as hell didn't," he says. "I tried to make peace with that, but I ended up back where I started."

"No, sweetie, you didn't," she says. "And I think you need to remember he did what he did so that you'd have a shot at somethin' better, because he wanted the world to be better. Don't let his sacrifice be for nothin' because I don't think he'd forgive you for wastin' it or mopin' around, you know?"

He nods, but she's not sure her words are getting through.

"He loved you every bit as much as you loved him," she reminds him, "so you go on ahead and keep missin' him. You got the right, but just remember you ain't alone, sweetie. Everyone who knows you, loves you, you just gotta keep rememberin' that, and if you need us, you just say so, and we'll be there."

His face collapses and he struggles to keep it together. Cindy drops an arm around his shoulders and musses his hair.

"I'll be your family, Prompto," she says. "You don't even gotta ask."

* * *

Cindy's already gone when Prompto wakes just after sunrise. There's a note taped to the door with instructions to meet her in front of the diner. When he arrives, she's in jeans and she stands beside two chocobos, a broad smile on her face and Prompto's heart almost fails.

"Mornin'," she says and plops a black cowboy hat on his head. "Thought we'd go riding. Make some new memories."

Prompto feels like crying and laughing at the same time. Instead he takes a picture of her seated atop her chocobo with a big, bright smile on her face.

They ride out onto the plain, past ruins and rock formations and shrubs, under the baking, sweltering sun, but Prompto's gotten used to it. He doesn't even mind the sand anymore, so long as it stays out of his eyes and mouth, and these days, he's learned to take precautions against it.

Cindy stops beside a watering hole, miles away from the outpost and produces a bag of sandwiches and drinks from her satchel. She's even brought a blanket to shield them from the sharp rocks and packed earth, and they sit in the shade and snack while the chocobos snack on greens beside the water.

It isn't the first time Prompto's been here, but it is the first time that it's just for fun. It's quiet and peaceful, away from the roar of cars on the highway.

When he finishes the sandwich, he lays back and tucks a hand behind his head to watch the clouds. Cindy does the same.

"What happened yesterday," he says. "That happen a lot?"

"Not often," she says. "Most know better."

"I woulda killed him if he hadn't let you go," he says.

"You're sweet, but you don't gotta worry about me none," she says. "I've cracked a lot of skulls with that wrench."

"I bet," Prompto says. "How come you're single, Cindy? You're, you know, pretty awesome."

"Well thanks," she says, "but men don't wanna play second fiddle to my work. They think they can handle it, and they can't."

"I always thought that was the best thing about you," he says and smiles at his memories. "How much you love doing what you do. How excited you get over engine parts and paint colors... Be still my heart."

"Aww, ain't you a sweetheart," she says. "But none of 'em seem to like their ladies covered in grease and stinkin' of gasoline. They think it's cute for a while, but once they figure out that they ain't number one on my list of priorities, they tend to take off."

"Then they're idiots." Prompto closes his eyes and smiles. "I used to get all worked up over the grease on your face. I loved that you didn't care."

"What about now?" she asks and her tone makes him open his eyes.

"Still love that you love it," he says. "Nothing sexier than a woman who knows herself."

Cindy grows serious and Prompto worries he's said something wrong.

"That's the sweetest thing any man has ever said to me," she says. "Most just tell me I got great legs."

"Yeah, that's me. Sweet," he says and fakes a laugh. "But, you know, they're not wrong. You do have great, you know, legs."

Cindy sits up and looks down at him.

"What 'bout you? How come some girl hasn't snatched you up already?"

"Still carrying a torch for a woman who's way out of my league," he says. "Not sure anyone else measured up. Besides. She's married to her work and I'd only get in the way."

"You love her?" she asks.

"Since the second I laid eyes on her."

* * *

Cindy's not sure how to respond. She knew about his crush, back when he was twenty and eager as a puppy for her attention, but never thought much about it in the years that followed. Back then, she found it amusing a little cute, but he was too young, and she was too busy to make time for romance.

All this time, he's kept it to himself.

She's touched, and a little sad.

He's been with her longer than any man she thought she loved in the past, but he's never touched her out of turn. Beyond a little flirting, he's never come on to her. He's never even set foot in her bedroom or suggested they change their sleeping arrangements. If he stares, his gaze is more reverent than lustful. He's loyal and kind, and smarter than he gets credit for, and she wonders why it never occurred to her there could be more to this.

He's not looking at her, but at the sky and his eyes follow the fat, fluffy clouds overhead. To the west, the sky is dark with thunderheads.

"Well, maybe some day, she'll love you back," she says, when she finds her voice again.

"Doubt it," he says. "She deserves more than anything I have to offer."

"I don't think that's true. You got plenty to offer the right gal," she says. "I just think maybe... you got a little more healin' to do before you're ready to let someone love you back."

He finally looks at her and tucks his other hand behind his head. "That apply to you, too?"

His perceptiveness strikes a chord. All these years, she's kept a solid wall around her heart and has chosen the wrong ones on purpose, men that she wouldn't get too attached to, so that when they left, she wasn't so hurt by it.

She's never fully recovered from her own losses. Her parents. Various friends lost to war. The first boy she loved, back when she was sixteen, a boy who loved her purely and completely and took parts of her when he left.

Prompto never learned how to protect himself from the pain inflicted by loss or from the cruelty of others. He leaves himself open for it, preferring to take direct hits on the off chance that someone will see his value and love him in return.

She sees now, not the broken remnants of a silly boy, but a man still capable of kindness and love, in spite of the lack of either in his life or in the world around him. She sees a starving man dying a slow death for want of it.

If she let him in, he would never leave, never stray, never ask her to choose him over her work, never complain that her hair smells like brake fluid or get pissed because she came to bed late, and 50 years from now, he'll still look at her like she's the only thing that matters.

She's not sure she can give him the same in return, and he can't afford to get his heart broken again. If he gets knocked on his ass one more time, Cindy's sure he won't get back up.

She pushes to her feet and offers her hand.

"Come on. Somethin' I wanna show you."

* * *

Prompto follows Cindy up a narrow path into the mountainside, torn between the crush of despair and curiosity about why she's brought him all this way. This is a spot he's never had a reason to explore, but he can't deny the view is pretty incredible.

"Just up ahead," she says.

Around the bend, they find several nests situated in recesses in the rock. Some contain big yellow eggs. Others, he sees upturned beaks and yellow feathers.

"They come here every year," she says as Prompto climbs off his chocobo. "Just for a few weeks, then they move on."

"This is awesome," he says as he crouches beside a nest full of fuzzy, yellow chicks, still half covered in pin feathers. "Look at you guys!"

The chicks peep at him and step all over each other to pile from the nest and into his lap. Prompto can't help but laugh, and his misery lifts a little as they peck at the zippers on his pants and the laces of his boots.

"Kweh!"

Prompto turns as a full grown chocobo plucks one of the chicobos from his lap and returns it to the nest.

"Hey, it's okay," he promises. "We're just hanging out."

The mother chocobo cocks her head at him and he cautiously reaches out to stroke her head. She leans her neck against his palm and he gives her a scratch. Her feathers ruffle and she shudders and gives a soft trill of pleasure.

"See?" he says. "It's all good."

Other chicobos leave their nests to join in, and soon, Prompto is covered in them. They're cute and fuzzy and every last one wants his attention. They perch on his arms and his shoulders, play with his hair and peck his belt buckle. One shoves its head in his armpit and pecks at his ribs and he bursts into laughter. The chicobos respond with a chorus of cheeping, like they're laughing with him.

To the left, he hears the soft click of his camera and glances over to see Cindy, on her knees peering at him through the lens. He beams at her, grateful she's brought him here.

"Thanks, Cindy. You're the best."

* * *

Note: Thank you for all your comments and subscriptions. :)


	3. Chapter 3

3.

* * *

They're headed out to the southern side of the Cauthess Disc, Cindy at the wheel of her tow truck. Prompto rides shotgun and he's got the music turned up, the window down and his gaze fixed on the landscape. Every now and then, he takes a picture.

A stillness has taken the place of both sorrow and his former youthful vivacity, and Cindy's wondered for a while if what she's seeing now is the real Prompto. From time to time, she sees flashes of the old one, the one with the easy, infectious laugh and goofy smile, and though it's rare, it happens more than it used to.

He still mourns, he still hurts, but most days, he's better. Peace is still a long way off, but he's getting there. In the meantime, Cindy's thought a lot about love, what it means, and what it would take for her to return it.

"So, you gonna tell me why we're drivin' all the way out here?" she asks.

"Nope," he says. His smile is smug and almost teasing. "It's a surprise. Take the next left."

Cindy makes the turn, down a road that barely qualifies as one. Her truck bounces over pot holes and ruts and shrubs scrape against the fenders. Whatever this is, it better be worth it.

"Stop here," he says and bounds out of the truck before she's even put it in park.

She follows him down an overgrown path, and the humidity has her melting inside her jacket. He darts off to the left and fumbles with some branches, lifts them away to reveal something Cindy's only daydreamed about.

It's a battered, rusted mess and all four tires are rotten, but there's no mistaking it for what it is.

"It's not the Regalia," he says, "but it's the same model it was based on."

"Well nail me to a barn and paint me red," she says, breathless. "I always wanted me one of these."

Prompto laughs and crosses his arms over his chest, proud of his find.

"Though maybe we could fix it up," he says and kicks one of the tires. "It's in pretty bad shape, but it might be fun."

"Fun," she echoes. "You have no idea."

"Got a pretty _good_ idea," he says with a sweet smile. "So, what do you say? Think it'll run?"

"Sure," she agrees with a nod. "Parts are hard to come by, but l can make her run."

He shoves his hands into his pockets and wanders closer and inspects the dented front grill. A ghost of a smile lifts the corners of his mouth and he brushes dirt from the hood.

"I'll help you," he says. "Find the parts and stuff."

"You don't gotta do that," she says as she inspects the car and begins to catalog what needs to be done to get it road worthy again. "Sorta been my dream to own me one of these, ever since you boys pushed the Regalia onto my lot."

"I know," he says with a smile.

He looks the car over, then turns back to her with more resolve in his eyes than she's seen in a long time.

"Whatever you need," he says. "I'll find it for you."

* * *

Prompto's in Insomnia, or what's left of it, on the hunt for a fuel injector. His search takes him into his old neighborhood, down a street he's reluctant to revisit. He stands on the sidewalk, outside his old apartment where he spent too many hours all alone, in silence, wondering if he would ever have what everyone else seemed to have.

The building is crumbling, rooms exposed to the elements. It's raining, and water pours from his old bedroom, where the walls are blackened by soot and grime and green with algae.

He hasn't set foot in this part of town in twelve years. He thought he left this part of himself behind, but that sad little boy who lived here once cries out for all the love he should have received.

Some people would have shut down, closed themselves off after surviving a childhood like that. He tried, but he could never manage to kill the desire to love and be loved.

Even now, he can't make himself be anything but kind, even when it's undeserved. Even when his hand is forced, and there's no other option but to kill, it's out of mercy and not hatred. No one should have to suffer, no matter how dark their soul.

This is why he doesn't regret the patricide Ardyn once accused him of. Or killing the MT's which were essentially pieces of himself that never got another choice. He did it out of mercy, but also for selfish reasons. Hope, that some day, there would be mercy for him, too.

He climbs the broken steps and memories assault him as he opens the warped apartment door. It's as he remembers, though the wall facing the street is gone.

For others, their childhood home is a place of fond memories, but for Prompto there's nothing here he could ever call happy. There are no photos on the mantle, no report cards proudly displayed on the fridge.

This was never his home. He only lived here.

He makes his way to his old bedroom. A layer of dirt and debris is matted into the soggy carpet and it reeks of mold and mildew. The only evidence of the old Prompto is a pair of worn out trainers in the closet and a ticket stub from the arcade, where he spent countless afternoons wasting time with Noctis.

When he turns back to the bed, a vision of his younger self sits on the edge, a camera in his hand. He scrolls through shots of pigeons and dogs that never belonged to him.

He sits on the damp and musty mattress beside the boy and wishes he could give him advice. He would tell himself to guard his heart more closely. That he will love and be hurt because of it. He will survive every blow that's to come but he will wish he never knew what it was like to stand on the other side of the line.

Nothing he says will change anything. This boy will make the same choices and feel the same joy and despair, endure the same wounds and lose himself somewhere along the way. He will leave this place in celebration and come back to face tragedy and his heart will break a hundred times before it's over.

The boy smiles at a photo of a kitten like it's a dear friend and Prompto pats his shoulder, and he remembers that this boy will do things he never dreamed he could do, things they told him he couldn't do. For as sad and lonely as this kid is, he has more courage than most grown men. When he made his mind up to do something, he did it.

He gets up and opens the drawers of the nightstand. Inside are a few yellowed comics and an assortment of faded photographs of other people's pets. The letter shouldn't still be here, but he finds it at the bottom, the fine linen paper water stained and the address illegible.

The paper is brittle as he unfolds the note. It's a miracle it hasn't been destroyed. The ink has bled, but he doesn't need to see her words to know what it says. He memorized it a long, long time ago.

He never knew her, but she gave him a gift. A friend for life. Someone to greet him in the afterlife.

He tucks the note inside his jacket, takes one last look at his former self and knows he won't come back here again.

* * *

It's after dark when he returns to the Hammerhead. Cindy's in the garage as expected, her long legs sticking out from underneath her new passion project. He stops to admire the view and smiles as she sings along with the radio, the Goddess of the Gears in her natural habitat.

He drops down beside the car and peers underneath. Her face is a mess of smears and her hair is dirty and tangled, but if there's anything more gorgeous in the world, Prompto's never seen it.

"Hey there, Grease Monkey," he says. "Got somethin' for ya."

"Hey!" she returns, her smile bright. "You're back late."

"Took a detour," he says and slides the package he's brought across the concrete floor.

"This what I think it is?"

"Yep," he says. "Brand new, too. Still in the factory packaging."

Cindy rolls all the way out and sits up to snatch the package into her lap. She tears off the paper like a child tearing into a much anticipated birthday gift and beams at the incomprehensible parts inside.

"How'd you get a hold of this?" she asks.

"Oh, you know. My irresistible charm," he says.

"Was that it?' she teases. "How much was it?"

"I got it, and that's all you need to know," he says. "Hope it's the right one."

"It's exactly what I needed," she says. "You're an angel."

Her grin makes him melt, but he's stunned into silence when she sits forward and gives him a peck on the lips, then leaps to her feet and pops the hood.

She's not even aware of what she's just done. Prompto sits on the floor and touches his fingers to his lips as his heart beats out a deafening cadence. He's just been done in by a friendly peck on the lips, and Cindy is none the wiser.

"You okay?" she asks.

"Fine," he says. "Awesome."

"You don't look fine," she says.

"Just tired," he lies. "You want something from the diner?"

"Sure," she says. "Can you get me a cheeseburger? Extra-"

"Pickles," Prompto says. "I know."

He isn't hungry, but he orders himself some fries and as he waits, he fights with himself about what it meant. He can still taste her lip gloss. He can still feel that brief but sweet pressure against his mouth.

She was just excited. He gifted her the thing she needed to get the car running again. It meant nothing.

When he returns to the garage, she's hard at work but pauses to wash her hands and eat at the desk with him. She steals a few of his fries, but Prompto doesn't mind.

"Might be able to get her started tonight," she says and her eyes gleam. "Can't decide what color to paint her. I was thinkin' black, like the Regalia. It's classy, you know?"

Prompto shakes his head.

"It's not the Reglaia," he says. "It's yours. Paint it whatever color you want."

"What color would you paint it?" she asks.

"Red."

"Nothin' says 'look at me' like red," she agrees. "Car like that deserves to be looked at."

Prompto leaves half his fries and pushes them toward her. She takes a few and dips them in ketchup.

"You headed to bed?" she asks as he gets up.

"I was thinking I could help," he says. "I don't know as much as you, but I've learned a few things."

"You wanna be here when I start her up," she says.

"Yep," he says, but it isn't the car he wants to see.

* * *

It's well past midnight when the project is done. Cindy climbs into the driver's seat, one leg inside, one dangling toward the floor. Prompto leans against the side and smiles as she sticks the key into the ignition.

"Here goes nothin'," she says.

It starts with a low rumble and she presses the gas peddle to make it roar. She looks at him with misty eyes and he nods his approval.

"You did it," he says.

"We did it," she says. She leans back in the driver's seat and smiles. "So, wanna take her for a spin?"

It's late, but Prompto can't deny her this. He's game for anything that makes her happy, and her happiness is reward enough for his efforts. He considers himself lucky that he gets a front row seat.

They climb into the car and Cindy stomps the accelerator and tears out of the parking lot, the tires screeching against pavement. Prompto laughs at her broad grin and watches the speedometer climb, 60, 65, 70, all the way up to 100 and beyond. She drives like all of hell is on her heels, reckless and too fast, but the wind is in his hair and it gets his blood pumping and he feels more alive than he has in weeks or months or maybe years.

He loves it, and he loves that she loves it. He can't imagine how any man could be jealous of something that gives her so much joy.

She pulls over, the engine still running and smiles at him.

"Your turn," she says.

He tries to beg off, but she insists, so he trades places with her and pulls out onto the road.

"Don't you dare baby that gas pedal," she says. "Step on it."

So he does and the car fishtails in the dirt before it finds purchase on the asphalt and he hits the straightaway going 70. Ignis would murder him if he ever drove the Regalia this way and he gets a bit of perverse pleasure at doing the thing Iggy would never do. His heart is in his throat when the speedometer hits 100 and he lets out a war whoop of repressed rebellion.

He eases off when it hits 120 and Cindy directs him to pull down a dirt road that ends at the ruins of an abandoned shack.

"That was fun," he says.

"Never figured you for a speed demon," she says.

"All your fault," he teases. "You're a bad influence."

"Then my work here is done," she says, her smile pleased. She climbs into the backseat and pats the space beside her. "C'mere."

Prompto hesitates, then crawls over the center console and into the back. Cindy makes herself comfortable, props her feet up and sighs happily.

"Is it everything you dreamed it would be?" he asks.

"And more," she says. "I owe you one."

"You don't owe me anything," he says. "Consider it compensation for your lumpy couch."

"Don't give a damn about my couch," she says. "You know I never use it anyway."

She grabs his wrist and drags his arm around her neck, and leans her head against his shoulder with a hum of contentment. Prompto's heart gives a squeeze.

"What did you wanna be when you grew up," she asks. "Was it always takin' pictures?"

Prompto can barely think straight, but a memory surfaces of a circus his class visited when he was young.

"You'll laugh," he says.

"I won't," she promises.

"You will."

"Tell me."

"I wanted to ride chocobos."

"Well, that ain't surprisin'."

"As a clown. In the chocobo rodeo."

Cindy cackles and her head tips back, her face to the sky.

"Told you you'd laugh," he says.

"When did you know you were dreamin' the wrong dream?"

Prompto falls silent. He can either talk about it or tell a lie. He chooses honesty. There are few secrets left between them, not now. Almost two years of seeing each other at their worst has made it nearly impossible to lie with any conviction, and Cindy has a way of seeing right through him.

"I told my family," he says. "And they told me I was too fat. That I'd break the chocobo's back."

Cindy settles her head back against his shoulder and slips an arm around his waist.

"Someone oughta bash their skulls in for what they done to you," she says. "Don't know much about it, but I know they done you wrong."

"I survived," he says, but he can't help but glance at the bar code on his wrist. "And I found a dream that was a little more practical."

"Your pictures," she says.

"Yeah," he says. "The plan was, I'd be Crownsguard for a while, you know, after the wedding, save up some money and open up my own studio, maybe take pictures for the papers on the side, family portraits. Stuff like that."

"You can still do somethin' like that," she says. "Sell some of them landscapes of yours to the tourists. Bet they'd love 'em."

"Maybe," he says.

"You should," she says. "Never too late, you know. Not while you got breath in your lungs and your mind's still sharp."

"I'll think about it," he says. "What about you? Did you always dream about cars?"

"Hmm, mostly," she says. "Back before my parents passed, I wanted to be a dancer for a bit. 'Cept, dance class wasn't as much fun as I thought it'd be."

Prompto smiles at the mental image of a pint-sized Cindy in a pink tutu.

"Bet you were cute," he says.

Her hair smells like power steering fluid. He's been around long enough to tell the difference.

"I was a mess," she says. "Wasn't too long before I was back in the garage, fetchin' tools for Pa."

"And that was it for you," he says.

"That was it. Only thing I ever wanted to do."

Prompto's chest aches because the only thing he's ever really wanted, he got, and it was ripped away from him too soon. There's no chance of going back.

"Hey Prompto?"

"Yeah?"

"Thanks for all this," she says. "You don't have to do none of it, you know."

"Did it because I wanted to," he says.

"Why?"

He sighs and leans his head back to look at the stars. Out here, where there are no lights, there are millions of them.

"Because it made you happy."

"Is that enough?"

"It's enough."

* * *

Note: A lot of readers asked if there was more. For the ones I couldn't reply to, the answer is yes. So far, I've got 6 chapters written and it looks like it'll be about 8 in total.

Thank you for the comments and follows!


	4. Chapter 4

4.

* * *

The nightmares start up again, after more than six months of peaceful, dreamless sleep.

Prompto doesn't know why. Things are good. His life here, where he said he never wanted to live, is comfortable. The couch is now perfectly molded to his body. Motor oil smells like home. He's even made his peace with the sand and the way it gets into everything.

These dreams are different from the others. He startles awake almost every night, gasping, shaking, horrified, and with Ardyn's voice still in his head.

"Tell me Prompto, do clones have souls?"

It's a question he does not know the answer to and one he's avoided thinking about for years.

Created, not born, from pieces of a madman. Does that mean he's capable of the same? Sometimes, he feels it in his bones, sure that he can be just as cruel, sure that if he let himself, he could become everything he hates, and he hates himself for it.

Were a heartbeat and a mind the only requirement for a soul? Was he a monster lying in wait, a monster, created by a monster?

In the light of day, these questions seem trivial. He fills the hours with photography, he washes cars, pumps gas, and fetches parts, and he can convince himself that he's okay. He still misses Noctis, but it doesn't hurt as much. He's able to function, to laugh and smile and actually mean it. If he isn't exactly happy, he's content. He has all he needs here.

But the dreams start to eat away at him and all the progress he's made. Night after night, he wakes, full of guilt and fear and sickened by the thought of becoming his father's son. His mind is filled with visions of the people he's lost, with all the blood spilled, the sound of gunfire and screams.

"Do you have a soul, Prompto?" Ardyn asks. "Or are you no better than a daemon?"

In dreams, Noctis pushes him off the train and laughs. It's Noctis who tortures him.

Sometimes, it's Cindy in restraints, all bloodied and broken with her eyes swollen shut, locked in a cell with blood dripping from her nose, her blood on Prompto's knuckles.

In dreams, he sees Iggy and Gladio fall on the steps of the citadel. One phoenix down among the three of them and Prompto chooses to save himself.

Always, the same questions on his mind when dawn arrives.

He senses a darkness in himself that he can't kill. It's there, coiling in his belly like a serpent, ready to strike.

The other dreams faded after a while, and he hopes these will too, but they don't.

They don't.

* * *

He sees a tourist with a young boy: a round, soft, chubby little thing that reminds Prompto of where he came from.

The tourist shouts and strikes the child. A painful crack echoes across the lot as the man's palm crashes against the boy's cheek. Prompto feels like he's the one who's been struck.

The boy can't be older than seven or eight, but he takes the hit like a seasoned fighter, conditioned to take the pain. The boy knew it was coming, and there's nothing but calm acceptance in his face. He's used to this. It isn't the first time, and it won't be the last.

Something inside Prompto's chest breaks into a thousand razor sharp pieces as the boy's eyes meet his. He sees himself looking back.

He bounds across the lot, his fists clenched, unable to stand aside, and forces himself between the boy and the man.

"What's the big idea?" he asks. "He's just a kid."

"Ain't your business," the man says.

"Does it make you feel tough?" Prompto demands and shoves the man so hard, he stumbles. "Beating on a little kid who's too small to fight back? Huh? What's wrong with you?"

"Fuck off."

Prompto takes a swing. His fist collides with the man's jaw. He feels a bone in his hand crack, but there's no pain, only rage, and a memory of being so afraid to fight back, he could only cower.

The man stumbles back, and Prompto's second punch knocks him down. Prompto is not finished. He can see nothing but Ardyn. Nothing but Verstael. Nothing but the man who raised him. This stranger has become everything he despises about this world, everyone who ever took something from him, and he can't stop until he's taken it all back.

There are shouts behind him, but Prompto can't make out the words until someone correctly identifies what he is.

"MT! He's an MT! Someone do something!"

He doesn't wear his wrist band when he helps Cindy in the garage. It only gets in the way, and she doesn't seem to care. He never figured anyone would notice anyway. Most are too wrapped up in themselves to pay attention.

He's lifted away from the man, kicking and screaming and out of his mind with rage. His knuckles bleed and his fingers swell, but still he wants to fight until he can't fight anymore.

The tourist doesn't get up. He lays still in a heap on the pavement while the boy sobs quietly into his hands.

It isn't the tourist on the ground, though. It's Ignis, his face a swollen, bloodied mess. His hair is streaked crimson, his sunglasses smashed and askew on his nose. Dead, dead, dead, past the point of saving.

The ground is shaking and daemons swell up from the concrete, in full daylight, where they're not supposed to be. Ardyn stands in the boy's place, smirking.

"Foolish, to deny what you are."

He fights the hands that hold him back, closes his eyes against the vision of Iggy's lifeless body and when he opens them again, he's in darkness and Cindy's face looms above him. His cheeks are wet and his skin is damp, but the room is cool. The air con pumps furiously at the window.

"You were sobbin' in your sleep, sweetie," Cindy says. She smooths clumps of hair away from his forehead and cheeks. "Just a nightmare."

He lifts her hands from his face and gets up. From his bag he retrieves his wrist band and covers the permanent reminder etched into his skin. It isn't worth the risk.

"I'm sorry," he says. "That I woke you."

"Nothin' to be sorry for," she says and she lays her palm between his shoulder blades. "Your heart's runnin' on all eight cylinders, ain't it?"

"I'm okay," he promises. "It's getting better."

"You wanna talk about it?"

He shakes his head and shivers when her arms encircle him from behind.

"Do you think clones have souls, Cin?" he asks.

"I reckon so," she says. "Can't imagine someone like you not havin' one."

Her chin rests against his shoulder. Her breath tickles his neck. He wishes he had the courage to turn around and kiss her like he means it, but he won't risk the friendship they've built. He needs to keep that intact more than he needs to get laid.

"One of many," he whispers. "All the same."

"You're the only one like you," she says. "One of many, but you ain't the same."

"It doesn't bother you?" he asks.

"Not one lick," she says. "What bothers me me is that it bothers you so much you wake up cryin' or screamin' your head off. You can talk to me, you know. I ain't gonna judge."

He lifts her hands from his waist and turns around, his head hanging because he can't look her in the eye.

"I'm afraid," he says. "That someday, I'll become him, or something like him."

Her fingertips brush over his cheekbone and he takes her wrist and pins it to his chest, unable to stand being touched without the option to reciprocate.

"I don't believe that for one minute," she says. "Whatever he was, he ain't you, no matter how you came into this world. I don't know why you don't know no better."

He's lying to himself. He still keeps secrets. Things he can't even think about, let alone admit to.

"Anybody ever tell you, you're beautiful, Prompto?"

He snorts and shakes his head. "That's definitely a new one."

"Well, you are. And, you ain't him, sweetie," she says. "You ain't."

"You don't understand," he says, and his voice has gone hoarse with emotion.

"All the did was make you," she says. "He ain't responsible for nothin' else. Not who you've become, not what you done so far, not what you're gonna do. And maybe you could be like him, but you ain't. You hear me? And you ain't got nothin' to prove that I don't already know."

He casts his gaze downward. What she doesn't know will be the death of him.

* * *

Cindy's got her hands full servicing a transmission, so when a call comes in about a stranded motorist, Prompto takes it. He drives out to the hunter's HQ in Cindy's tow truck with the air con on high and the radio turned to something obnoxious and loud, and he ignores the ill ease in his belly that says there's something nasty on the horizon.

He pulls up alongside a black car with a magenta chocobo sticker on the bumper and parks. Steam pours from underneath the car's hood and he catches a whiff of antifreeze as he climbs from the cab of the truck.

The driver eases herself off the passenger side door and Prompto loses his breath.

Her dark hair is longer and streaked with pink, but he recognizes her. How could he not? He watched her grow up, a pesky, opinionated ten year old upon their first meeting, and an accomplished slayer of daemons upon their last.

His whole body freezes up and he's chilled all away to the marrow of his bones.

"Prompto?" she asks in a small voice. "Is that really you?"

All he can do is stare at her wide eyes and the slender, tapered fingers pressed against her lips. He always figured it would catch up with him, but not quite like this.

Her eyes fill with tears and she launches herself at him. Her arms go around his middle and she squeezes him with all her might.

"I thought you were dead," she says.

He should be, but somehow, he's still here.

One phoenix down among the three of them, and Gladio, with the last of his strength, chose to save Prompto instead of himself, though he had more left in this world to live for than either Iggy or Prompto.

Noctis wasn't the only one who made a sacrifice that day. Why is a question Prompto has never allowed himself to consider.

When Iris lets go, he sees traces of Gladio in her face and it feels like someone's carved out his heart.

"I'm sorry, Iris," he breathes. "I'm sorry."

He slips to his knees and thinks he might vomit.

For more than two years, he's avoided this. It hurts to think about Noctis, but that pain is manageable.

It's all the rest that Prompto can't handle.

* * *

Cindy's elbow deep in an engine when the tow truck pulls up in front of the garage, absent a broke-down car. She waves at the shape in the cab and assumes Prompto was able to fix the vehicle on his own until a young woman climbs out of the driver's side. She looks familiar, but Cindy' can't quite place her.

She's annoyed, then concerned when Prompto doesn't join her.

"Cindy, right?" the girl asks.

"That's me," Cindy says and wipes her hands on a shop rag. "Where's Prompto?"

"In the truck. I don't know what happened," the girl says. "Something's wrong."

"Let's take a look," Cindy says and remembers who the girl is. "You're Gladio's lil' sis, right?"

"That's right," she says. "Iris."

"How's he doin' these days?"

Iris's eyes go blank. "He's dead."

Cindy stops and stares. This is news to her.

"So sorry to hear that," she says. "What happened?"

"He... he died defending Noctis," Iris says. "Iggy, too. Everyone thought Prompto died with them."

Cindy draws in a deep breath, and her heart gives a hard squeeze. She just assumed, if Prompto survived it, the others did too, and suddenly, it all makes sense.

She never thought to ask about them. Early reports following that final fight said the King and his guard all died, but she took Prompto's arrival as a sign the reports were wrong. She figured, they were off somewhere, trying to rebuild their lives, just like Prompto was. She knew well how tragedy could either draw people closer together or split them apart forever.

All this time, and he's never mentioned them. There have been no phone calls or visits the whole time he's been here, and she never thought to wonder why. These are all questions she should have had the foresight to ask, but never did.

She's enabled him by not thinking about the bigger questions, let him get away with not facing it. She thought her company was enough, that he was slowly working through his grief at his own pace when that was never the case. All she did was allow him to hide it, to bury it. It's no wonder he's struggled so bad.

Inside the cab, Prompto is curled up in the closest approximation to the fetal position he can manage in the bucket seat. He doesn't respond to her voice or her touch and it takes both ladies to haul him out.

On his feet, he's able to walk with Cindy's guidance, but he doesn't answer questions and his gaze is empty and a thousand miles away. She suspects this is the cause of his nightmares, the cause of his lingering heartbreak, the reason for his reluctance to move forward. It was never just a difficult childhood or the loss of his best friend. There was always more.

She and Iris take him home, where she strips off his boots and eases him down onto the couch. He stares at the ceiling, through the ceiling, as if he's retreated so far inside himself, he can't be reached.

Her eyes get misty as she turns out the light. She's failed him and she doesn't know what to do about it.

Iris is crying by the time they return to the garage.

"I heard the rumors," Iris says. "But, I thought they were just rumors, you know? I mean, every now and then, someone claims to have seen Gladdy somewhere, alive and well. I didn't follow up because, well..."

She looks at the photos on the wall of the garage, photos Prompto took of some of the more interesting restorations and paint jobs Cindy's done. She lingers on one of four of them posed in front of the Regalia, before the fall, before treachery made a King of a boy.

How innocent they were then. Ignis, the brains, Gladio the brawn, Prompto the heart, Noctis the soul. Like they were four parts of a complete person, yet individual and distinct unto themselves. It made sense that they'd all face it together. No doubt, Prompto believed they should have all met the same fate. Whatever twist that spared him and him alone was most certainly the source of his pain, if not the only factor.

"I can't tell you how many times I chased down a lead," Iris says. "Someone would say they spotted Gladdy at some outpost and I'd take off, hoping against hope that it was true. They never found the bodies, you know? But, it was always just... he was never there."

She sighs and turns around.

"He must feel so guilty," she says. "Being the only one who made it."

"I reckon he does," Cindy says. "He never said nothin'."

"Yeah, that's Prompto," Iris says. "He always seemed so cheerful, but I know he kept the real stuff to himself. I remember when we were kids, he never wanted to go home. It was a long time before I knew the reason why."

"Yeah," Cindy agrees. "I shoulda known better. I shoulda known there was more."

She promises to get Iris' car in the morning and sends her off to the diner, puts her project on hold, and goes to check on Prompto.

He's gone. His things are gone. On the table are his keys to the garage.

She finds Iris at the camper and they search for him half the night. They check campgrounds and shacks, but Prompto is nowhere to be found. Wherever he's gone, he can't be far, but he's done a fine job of staying hidden. All she can do is hope he'll come back in the morning, once his head is clearer.

It feels like she's been left by a lover, one she was fond of, another in a long line of men she let down by being too focused on her work.

The worst part is that he's never so much as kissed her, but his absence hurts more than any of the others.


	5. Chapter 5

For a few days, Prompto hides out in the basement of a ruined house. He doesn't think about anything at all. His mind's gone blank and he goes so deep inside himself, he's unaware of the hours passing or the time of day. He doesn't hear Iris and Cindy calling his name. He doesn't know how long he's been there. When his phone rings, he hurls it across the room, where it smashes into the cracked concrete wall and splits into pieces.

It doesn't ring again.

When his stupor lifts, he smells rain, and water pours in from the small, square opening in the foundation above. Thirst drives him to the surface and he sprawls out on his back, his mouth open to the sky and lets the rain wash him clean.

He still doesn't understand why he's here. Why Gladio chose to save him. Who he is anymore.

Thunder echoes across the plain and the churning clouds deepen in color. The wind picks up, the rain falls harder, but Prompto stays where he is.

Lightning streaks through the clouds above. It's an awesome display of nature's power, one that reminds him there's still beauty in dark things.

"Why would you leave me behind?" he asks. "Why?"

He moves on when the storm passes, a shell of a man, but one who can think again instead of one without a mind. There's an anger stewing in his chest, resentment so deep, he can barely see straight.

He thinks about it a lot, what Gladio did. Thinking about it brings him no closer to understanding, but at least the memory doesn't make his whole world tilt on its axis.

He was prepared to die that day. Terrified, but prepared, and he wasn't doing it alone. Iggy and Gladio were right there, just as afraid, but ready to give their lives as brothers, friends, shields of the King. It should have gone without saying that if they went, he would go, too. It should never have been a question.

Why would Gladio save Prompto when he knew how much Prompto feared being left alone? Didn't he know, there was no other option? No life for him beyond the coming dawn if they weren't there beside him at the end? Didn't he?

Iggy went down first, the blow that killed him instant, a mercy, his life gone in a second. He did not suffer.

Prompto went down next, his chest crushed, ribs splintered, lungs punctured, drowning in his own blood. He tried to get back up, to keep fighting, but he could barely hold his head aloft. Pain like he'd never known before rendered him immobile, impossible to draw breath without choking on it.

The sky began to lighten, from black to navy, a hint of gold on the horizon.

It was beautiful, but Prompto knew what it meant. Noctis did what he came to do. All Prompto had to do was hold on, hold on, until there was nothing left to fight. Then they could all be together as brother in the afterlife.

"Stay down," Gladio ordered. "It's not over."

In those last minutes, Prompto accepted his fate, happy even, to give his life for a friend, for a kingdom, and for the world. He was not born of nobility, not raised with the same privilege, but he knew his choices made him so. He belonged somewhere, he was good enough for a king, he had a family, and that was worth dying for.

Gladio stumbled up beside him and slipped to his knees, one hand clutched to his stomach. Blood gushed between his fingers, thick and dark and viscous. His face bleached of color, and his eyes were far away.

Gladio pressed a Phoenix Down to Prompto's chest. Broke it open.

"Go and live your life, little brother."

"No."

It was too late. The curative did its job, mending broken bones and drained the fluid from Prompto's lungs, filled his limbs with life as Gladio slumped over.

"No!"

Everything around him, the fighting, the death, all the struggle ceased, and the silence was so absolute, Gladio's slow, ragged breaths were as loud as a gale.

Prompto sat up and rolled Gladio onto his back, and that was a mistake. Blood gushed from the open wound on his stomach and it pulsed with the beating of Gladio's heart.

"No!" Prompto choked. "No! Why? Why would you..."

"Live, Prompto," Gladio murmured. "For us..."

The light faded from Gladio's eyes and they fixed on the ever lightening sky above, gone, gone forever. Prompto searched Gladio's pockets, his own, Iggy's, and found nothing that could help. A single Phoenix Down among them, and this was what Gladio chose to do with it.

It wasn't fucking fair.

He could have saved himself. Iris was a damned good reason to stay. He saved Prompto instead. Prompto, who had _nothing_ in this world if they were gone.

Prompto opened his mouth and let out a wail of agony, of betrayal and loss. He cursed Gladio's name between sobs so deep his throat grew raw and his voice gave out.

"Why would you do this to me?" he croaked at Gladio's body. "Live for you? For _what_?"

Gladio was gone. Iggy. Noctis. They were gone and he was still alive, still breathing.

"You can't leave me alone, you _can't_!"

The daylight burned his eyes, already swollen and stinging from crying, and the city was a ruin. There was nothing left here, nothing left of his home, and nothing left to look forward to. Even the first glimpse in ten years of a gold and cerulean sky did not move or inspire him. He'd been cheated, left behind.

He has no memory of leaving the city. He has no memory of the days that followed. He doesn't know what he ate, or where he slept, or how he survived for weeks and months on the outskirts of Insomnia with nothing more than the clothes on his back and a rifle pilfered from a fallen soldier. He remembers almost nothing until he found himself in Cindy's garage, too exhausted to keep going.

He's still alive, but he's not living, he's simply getting by and waiting for his turn to join them in the afterlife. It should be easy to make that happen, to end it, but there's still a part of him that clings to this world, a part that won't let go.

* * *

Cindy and Iris look for Prompto for more than a week, but their search turns up little. Iris found a smashed phone in the basement of a ruin, Cindy a spot near the mines where someone made a makeshift camp. There's no evidence it was Prompto, and no one's seen him around.

Iris has to return to Lestallum, but she promises to stay in touch and keep an eye out for him. Cindy promises to call if he turns up.

She barely sleeps the first week and jumps at every sound in the night, sure it's Prompto come limping home with his tail between his legs.

It never is.

It's lonely without him. She never realized how much she came to rely on him until he was gone and she can't stop checking the clock in the evenings, sure he's going to come bustling through the door with the dinner she forgot to eat and a gentle reminder not to stay up too late.

"You've got it bad," Holly says on the phone. "Never heard you like this over a man, Cin. Especially not one you weren't banging."

"I'm just worryin' 'bout him is all," Cindy says.

"If I didn't know better, I'd say you loved this guy."

For most of her life, Cindy's believed love is fire, heat, all consuming passion. That it burns bright for a while then sputters and dies when it runs out of tinder. It's only now she understands that sometimes it's patient and enduring and makes no demands. She's never known the latter in a lover, but the more she thinks about it, the worse she feels and the more she misses him.

"It's complicated," Cindy says and Holly laughs.

* * *

Prompto walks the soles off his boots and stops in Lestallum to buy new ones. He doesn't plan to stay long, but as he shops the market for supplies, he runs into Iris. That feeling of panic comes over him again, that sickness, and he runs, but she catches up with him on a side street and convinces him to stay the night at her apartment a few blocks away.

He's not ready to face her. He's only just now able to think about Gladio without feeling so angry it makes him want to throw up, but he's too tired to fight.

Iris urges him toward the bath and then offers him the guest room for the night. He's tempted to stay awake and split while she sleeps, but the second his head hits the pillow, his eyes drift shut.

He sleeps through the night, and there are no dreams for a change. He wakes to curtain filtered sunlight and the scent of sausage and coffee. His clothes are clean and laid out on a chair by the bedroom door and Prompto thanks all the stars for women who are not only strong but also thoughtful and kind.

She's in the kitchen, pushing slightly burnt eggs around in a frying pan. There's a haze of smoke in the air and Prompto reaches past her and turns down the heat. He can't cook to save his life, but he's pretty sure, if it's burning, it's time to turn it off.

"Sorry," she said. "Hope you like your eggs extra crispy."

"Still looks better than anything I've ever cooked," he says. "You didn't have to, you know."

"I know," she says. "I just didn't feel like going out this early."

What she really means is that she was afraid to leave, afraid he'd split while she was gone. If he woke to find himself alone, he would have.

They eat in an uncomfortable silence and Iris watches his every move. She has questions, and eventually she's going to ask, so he draws it out as long as he can though breakfast is barely edible. At least the coffee is good.

"Cindy's worried sick about you," she says.

Prompto ducks his head and pushes his plate away.

"I know," he says. "I'm just...figuring some stuff out."

"Such as?"

He shrugs.

"We can't help you if you don't talk about it," she says. "I know it's hard losing people, but don't forget, you're not the only one who lost them."

Prompto sits there for a long time without speaking. He wishes he could talk and explain himself and all the awful feelings he can't seem to get rid of. He wishes he could tell Iris how sorry he is that Gladio was gone. He's the only one left, and it isn't easy to go on knowing Gladio could be sitting in his place right now.

"Will you tell me?" she asks. "What happened?"

He gathers the dishes and carries them to the kitchen and washes them instead of giving her an answer.

"Was it that bad?" she asks. "That you can't talk about it?"

Prompto chest hurts but he nods.

"Was he in pain? At the end?"

He was, but Prompto lies and tells her Gladio went quick, he didn't suffer. She doesn't need to know he died with his guts spilling out onto the steps of the Citadel. Prompto alone will keep that memory.

"He saved me," he blurts out. "Iris, he had one Phoenix Down left. He could have saved himself, but he gave it to me. I don't know why he did that."

Iris is stunned into silence. Her eyes are round with surprise and she sits down at the table and stares.

"Why would he do that to me, Iris?" he asks.

She shakes her head, left speechless by his confession.

"You want the truth?" Prompto asks. "I hate him for it. I'm furious with him. I don't know how I'm supposed to be okay with that."

Iris wipes tears from her cheeks, sniffles a little, but looks Prompto in the eye.

"Maybe he thought you'd have a better chance at building a new life than he would," she says. "Maybe, he wanted to give you a future you could actually enjoy."

"He took my family from me," Prompto says.

"And gave you the world instead," she says.

"I was supposed to die with them!" he shouts. "They were all I had!"

Iris gets up and throws her arms around him. Prompto does not return her embrace but stands perfectly still and unbending. She hugs him harder but it doesn't quiet his anger or lessen his guilt.

"They weren't your only family, Prompto," she says.

Prompto breaks. He bows his head into her shoulder, shaking as a flood of tears come on. He hasn't cried outside of nightmares in so long, he was sure he'd forgotten how.

It doesn't feel good. It doesn't purge him the way it should, and it's a while before he collects himself enough to let her go. When he does, he sits down at the table and leans his face into his palms, ashamed of how weak he's become.

"I know Gladdy was hard on you," she says. "But I think he loved you as much as he loved Noctis, maybe even as much as he loved me. I mean, it's pretty hard not to."

It should be a compliment, but it stings.

"Why didn't he stick around for you?" Prompto asks.

"Maybe because he knew I'd be alright on my own," she says with a shrug. She clears her throat. "I'm not going to lie and say I wasn't devastated. I still miss him. I always will, but every time it starts to hurt again, I go outside and I remember, the four of you gave me sunlight again."

She reaches across the table and takes his hand.

"For better or worse, you're alive," she says. "And you can either keep wandering around feeling sorry for yourself and give up and die on some campground somewhere, or you can pull yourself together and go out and live all those dreams you never thought would come true."

Her words are not so dissimilar to the things Aranea once said to him when he was on the brink of giving up. Less harsh, but still the same message.

"That's what I'm trying to do, anyway," she says. "Their sacrifice wasn't for nothing."

"Does it help?"

"Sometimes."

Iris lets go of his hand and sits back in her chair to look him over. He's sure he seems half a vagrant with his overlong hair and scruffy goatee and threadbare clothes. It's been a while since he paid attention to his appearance. Regular bathing is enough of a struggle.

"You'll make it through this, Prompto. You are and always have been the one of the strongest people I know. Even stronger than Gladdy in some ways," she says.

Prompto disagrees. He's not strong. He's come apart, come undone, and he's not sure how to move on or keep going anymore, but knowing Iris doesn't hate him helps. At least she doesn't think he selfishly saved himself.

"If you're ever lonely," she says, "take a good look at the world you guys made possible, or pick up the phone and call me, come visit, write, but don't keep it all inside, okay? I'd hate to hear you went off and did something stupid without giving me a chance to tell you what an idiot you are first."

Prompto actually laughs. It's a shy laugh, one that keeps his eyes riveted to the table, but laughter nonetheless.

"When did you get so wise, Iris?" he asks.

"You're welcome," she says. "Now, go home. Cindy's waiting for you."

* * *

It's almost two in the morning when Prompto sees the lights of the Hammerhead burning bright on the horizon. He climbs the hilltop above it, his pack slung over one shoulder, his camera over the other. The door of Cindy's garage is open, a car on the lift. She's working late, loves what she does, lost track of time, can't sleep for want of it, and he still loves her for it.

He's been gone for almost four months. He's walked a thousand miles, and taken twice that amount of pictures. He's tried his hand at cooking, burned or under cooked a lot of good meat, but finally made something palatable somewhere around his twentieth try. He's pretty sure Iggy would be proud. He's fished, he's camped, he's survived, and he's more at peace because he took the time to do those things.

This is what Gladio meant. What Iris meant.

It's not so bad, being alive. The world is big and beautiful, and there's no time of day when the light isn't perfect for a shot, not a moment when the feel of sunlight on his skin isn't a gift. Gladio gave him the world so that he could document this new future, so he could change and grow with it, and laugh and love and finally sleep without bad dreams.

He hears rumors of change and progress, of nations joining together, and he sees all the hope in people's eyes and knows he was a part of that. He hasn't entirely purged the ghosts that haunt him, nor will he ever be innocent again, but he's doing his best to walk tall and take each day as it comes.

He thinks of making camp here and moving on in the morning, before the sun is up. He's trying to find his courage again, but he's been gone so long, she'll probably throw him out.

Even if she does, at least he can say he tried.

"I stand on hallowed ground," he says to himself. "Here before the Garage of the Goddess."

What a thing to remember after all these years. How Noctis complained, yet how amused he seemed as he fed Prompto lines to help him not be a colossal dork in front of the most amazing woman Prompto had ever laid eyes on.

"Man, I miss you, dude," he says. "I could really use some of your suave council right now. She's probably gonna be pretty pissed."

Down below, Cindy closes the garage door, but the lights still burn behind the windows.

"You'd probably tell me I'm an idiot for running away in the first place," he says. "For listening that stupid voice in my head that keeps telling me I'm not good enough."

He sighs and sits on a rock, willing himself to be brave.

"I'm trying, but... I miss you, buddy. And, you know, if you're in touch with the gods or whatever, put in a good word for me, okay? I could use all the help I can get... And tell Gladio... Thanks."


	6. Chapter 6

6.

* * *

Cindy's in her office when the bell over the garage's side door jingles. She takes her wrench from her work belt as footsteps echo through the garage. Probably just a broke-down motorist, but she's not taking any chances this late at night.

"Can I help y'all with somethin'?" she asks as she exits the office. "Unless it's an emergency, it'll have'ta wait until the mornin'."

Cindy stops in her tracks and gapes at the man standing beside the worktable.

His hair is longer but his face is clean shaven and his clothes, though worn, do not look like he's slept for several days in the dirt. This isn't the half starving man who found his way to her three years ago. This man is strong and healthy, clear eyed, and shows no sign of going to pieces.

"Hi," he says.

She's relieved he's alive. She's happy to see him.

She's also furious with him for not trusting her enough to listen.

"You been gone four months and that's all you got to say to me?" she says.

"You were worried about me?"

"After the way you left outta here? You bet your little behind I was!" she says. "Then Iris calls a while back and says you're comin' home, and I figure you're on your way, and you show up three months later and nobody's seen or heard nothin' from you in all that time! You're damn right, I worried!"

Cindy's near tears, and she's not a woman who cries often, and almost never in front of other people. She's almost more pissed about the lump in her throat and the sting of tears in her eyes than she is about Prompto's absence. That, she understands. This? Getting emotional over a man? That is a problem.

He's not just some man, though, and her feelings are far too complicated to sort out at two in the morning. If any man is worth tears, it's Prompto.

"Can I explain?" he asks. "Please?"

Cindy wants to be petty and punish him, not for his absence, but for the silence that followed, and she can't. She knows why he needed time to sort himself out, and she's already forgiven him for it. It's the not knowing, the waiting, that has her so reluctant to give him a warmer welcome.

"Iris told me," she snaps. "You don't gotta explain anything."

It's only then he turns his gaze away from her face.

"Okay," he says. "I deserve that."

He rubs his eyes, sighs and shoves his hands into the pockets of his jeans.

"For what it's worth, I'm sorry," he says. "I owe you a lot for taking me in. I probably wouldn't be standing here if you hadn't. I don't want you to think I took that for granted."

"That ain't what I'm pissed about," she says.

"I know," he says. "I... I should have called."

"You're damn right," she says. "You should have called."

He lifts his head and there's something so sorrowful, yet hopeful, in his face, Cindy gives up on any pretense of anger. He hasn't come back to her all banged up and broken and worse off than he was before. Something's changed for the better. If time away helped, then she can let it go.

From his bag, he retrieves a bundle wrapped in butcher paper and sets it on the worktable.

"You ain't gonna win me over by bringing me stuff," she says. "I ain't that kinda girl."

"Never thought you were," he says with a soft smile. "Open it."

Cindy unwraps the paper and finds dozens of small bags of dust and ore inside. Enough to paint ten or twenty cars, by the looks of it. She marvels at all the different shades, and at the man who brought them to her.

"You gotta stop bein' so nice to me," she says. "You don't owe me nothin'."

"I don't do it because I feel like I owe you," he says. "I mean, you look out for me, I look out for you, right? We're family?"

The tears that threatened to spill before well up in the corners of her eyes.

"No strings attached, Cin," he says. "Promise."

He means it, and his sincerity is what breaks the dam. She fights it, but it's too late. Tears streak down her cheeks and Prompto steps forward to dry them, and that only makes it worse.

"Hey. Don't cry," he says and brushes the tears from her cheeks with pads of his thumbs. "I hate seeing girls cry."

"It's your fault," she says through sniffles and lands a light blow against his chest with the back of her fist. "If you weren't so damn sweet..."

"I guess I should work on that, huh?" he says and clasps her wrist to keep her from hitting him again. "Learn to be an asshole, treat you like crap."

"Don't you dare," she says with a laugh. "But don't you dare run off on me again and not call, neither."

He steps back and crosses his arms over his chest, made insecure by the reminder.

"I..." he begins and then pauses. "Iris gave me an earful. She wasn't wrong, it just, it took me a while for it to really sink in."

Cindy's boots are pinching her feet, so she slips them off and perches on the work table. Forty's a year away, and she's starting to feel it. Prompto sits beside her.

"I was in this field one night," he says and rubs his chin. "You know, it was real nice out and the sky was full of stars, but all I could think about was spending the rest of my life alone because I didn't want to risk loving and then losing people again. It was easier to shut down, shut out the world, than it was to find the courage to go forward."

Cindy understands what he means. She's spent a lifetime trying not to get too close.

"Anyway, I'm about to make camp when this swarm of fireflies just comes out of nowhere," he says. "All these tiny little lights winking on and off, talking to each other. It took my breath away."

He wrings his hands in his lap and rubs his thumb across a scabbed over abrasion on his right palm.

"I stood there for twenty minutes," he says. "Just watching them. I actually felt bad the guys weren't there with me to see it. Like they were missing out on something really awesome. That's when it really hit me that I'm not ready to give up just yet, even though I thought that's what I wanted."

He lapses into silence and Cindy waits for him to collect his thoughts.

"I know I can survive on my own," he says, "and I'm okay if I have to, but I don't want to. I hate being alone."

"Well, you ain't," Cindy says. "Like you said, you look out for me, I look out for you, and I betcha Iris feels the same way."

He nods and smiles at his hands.

"Guess I'm pretty lucky," he says. "To know so many smart, strong ladies who aren't afraid to kick my ass when I'm feeling sorry for myself."

"So long as you don't keep lettin' it knock you down, you go on and feel any kinda way you need to feel."

"I think... I'm gonna be okay, Cin," he says and nods to himself. "I'm still pissed at Gladio, but I understand now why he did it. Even if it wasn't what I would have chosen for myself, I'm grateful."

She reaches for his hand and holds on.

"Then I'm grateful, too," she says. "But next time, you talk to me instead of runnin' off, you hear me?"

"Yes, ma'am," he says. "But, there won't be a next time. If I waste the time I've been given, Gladio will kill me all over again in the afterlife."

"I'll hunt you down and help him," Cindy says. "You got a lot of livin' left to do."

"Yeah," he says. "Lots of stuff I need to cross off the old bucket list, huh?"

"That's the spirit," she says.

He's much stronger than he realizes, and the world needs more men like him. Men who are kind for the sake of being kind, who give without expecting anything in return. Loyal men who cherish their loved ones over and above all else. Men who embrace their flaws and weaknesses instead of projecting them onto others. He's not perfect, but he doesn't try to be, and instead strives to be better, to give more, to fight harder.

It's so endearing, and so heartbreaking, Cindy's inclined to find out where this leads. It's hard not to love him for everything he is, for everything he isn't, and for all he's endured, for his patience, and for that sweetness that no amount of hardship can steal from him.

"S'pose we should get some sleep," she says. "Got an early day tomorrow."

Cindy showers, brushes her teeth and heads to bed, but her stomach flutters when she passes by the living room and sees Prompto settling down in a nest of sheets and blankets on the couch. She pauses to look him over and that fluttering spreads into her chest.

He believes he's unworthy, but Cindy will not find a better man anywhere in the world.

He has too much respect for her, and too little confidence in himself. He will never ask for more, even if it's what he needs.

She needs him too. She's cut herself off from deeper, more emotional relationships, and finds herself starved for something real and lasting.

If only she had the courage to let down her guard and invite him in.

* * *

Prompto doesn't peel himself up off the couch until almost noon. He can't remember the last time he slept this late.

Cindy's sitting on the floor of the garage, her legs splayed out, a pile of assorted bolts and screws between her knees. She combs through them, muttering under her breath, but she smiles when he crouches down beside her.

"Hey, how'd you sleep?"

"Like a dead man," he says, and Cindy frowns. He nods to the mess in front of her. "That looks like a whole bunch of no fun."

"Tryin' to find a 10mm bolt," she says. "I know I've got a hundred of 'em somewhere, but I can't find a one."

Cindy's more organized than this. She keeps her hardware neatly sorted into bins, by type and size.

"You check the cabinet?" he asks.

"I did," she says. "Got every size but the one I want."

"Need some help?" he asks.

"Nah, I got this," she says. "Just been real busy around here lately and it kinda got away from me."

Prompto feels bad for taking off and leaving her to handle everything on her own.

"You got any plans today?" she asks and pushes a pile of washers off to the the side.

"Nothing in particular," he says. "Why? You need something?"

"Dave called earlier," she says. "He's been lookin' for you. Says he's got a job if you got the time."

"Sure," he says. "I'll run out there in a bit."

"Aha!" she says and holds up a bolt that looks just like the rest of them. "Gotcha."

"Hey Cin?" he asks. "You ever finish the car?"

Her face goes blank, then she grins and hops to her feet. "I forgot you ain't seen what I done to her."

She flings the cover off a car he's only just now noticed. It's painted a deep metallic cherry with an ultra fine pinstripe down the side in gold. On the front driver's side fender, in Cindy's fancy, loopy script are the words _Grease Monkey_.

"You named it," he says with a big smile. "That's awesome."

"She sure is purty, ain't she?" she says, wistfully. "Came out real nice."

"The purtiest," Prompto agrees. "Love the color."

"Thought you would," she says. "If you wanna drive her out to see Dave, you're welcome to it."

"You sure you trust me?" he asks, skeptical. "I don't have the best track record."

"I know you'll take real good care of her," Cindy says and squeezes his arm. "Keys are in the ignition."

With the top down, he cruises out to meet Dave, a bit nostalgic for the early days riding shotgun in the Regalia. Iggy chugging Ebony by the gallon. Gladio with his books. Noct, sleeping.

How he missed them.

"Wish you were here, guys," he says. "Especially you, Gladio. I owe you a head bashing."

He laughs to himself, almost drives off onto the shoulder and then thinks of how Iggy was almost more terrified of Noctis' driving than his. Noctis paid attention to the road, but he drove like there were no laws and couldn't hold the wheel straight to save his own life.

Prompto can almost feel them there with him. Rather than bring him down, it lifts his spirits. It's the first time thinking about them didn't tear him to pieces, but it's bittersweet, knowing the good times are behind him.

By the time he parks in front of the old HQ, some of the burden has lifted.

"Heya, son," Dave greets. "Damn glad to see you."

"Good to see you, too," he says, and he means it.

"For a while there, I was worried I'd be out there lookin' your dog tags," Dave says. "After you done disappeared on Cindy like that."

"Nah," Prompto says. "Just takin' a breather. I'm back."

"Well, good, 'cause I got a job for ya," Dave says. "Guy asked for you specifically. Said he didn't want no one else."

"Huh," Prompto says. "What's the job?"

"Tag retrieval," Dave says. "As usual. Didn't give no name, but he said it was real important to him."

"Alrighty then," Prompto says. "I'm on it."

Hunts these days are nothing compared to the days of darkness. Monsters are no match for daemons. Not much challenge, either, but Prompto's never cared much for having to kill.

He's good at it. Really good. He was built for it, after all, but he doesn't get a thrill out of it the way some of the others do. It's just a job, and at least he's not hunting people or MT's.

He arrives at the specified location, Brackham Haven, and finds a tent already set up, with four camp chairs. A set of tags dangles from the arm of all but one. Perplexed, Prompto investigates the one closest.

Stamped on it is a familiar name.

Ignis Scientia.

"The hell?"

The next one says Gladiolus Amicitia.

A flare of anger tears through him as he checks the last one, though he already knows the name it bears.

He grips the tag in his fist and turns in a circle, ready to fight whoever did this.

"This isn't funny."

"I didn't mean for it to be funny."

Prompto turns around.

"Holy shit!" Prompto breathes. "Cor!"

"Hello to you, too, Prompto," Cor says. "You look well."

Prompto doesn't know what to say. He's always been in awe of the man, and nothing's changed. Cor the Immortal, whom Prompto all but fangirled over at twenty.

He's furious over this, though. No amount of respect for Cor's relative badassery can lessen the blow.

"The hell do you think you're doin', dude?" He holds up Noctis' dog tag and shakes it. "Where did you get these?"

Cor sits down in the camp chair meant for Noctis.

"You've done well for yourself over the years," Cor says. "I hear you're quite accomplished."

"Cut the bullshit," Prompto says. "Answer me."

Cor squeezes the bridge of his nose and shakes his head.

"Cor."

"Imagine my surprise when I went to retrieve the dead and discovered you weren't among them," Cor says. "The official story is that the bodies were absorbed when Noctis made his sacrifice."

Prompto has not paid attention to any news regarding Insomnia or that final fight. Theories and speculation do not interest him. He was there. He knows all he needs to know about it.

"Let me guess, you made off with them before anyone else could."

"Mmm. And buried them in their rightful place."

"So, what's the point of dragging me out here, then?" Prompto asks.

"I heard a rumor that you were alive," Cor says. "I wanted to confirm."

"You couldn't just come out to the Hammerhead and talk to me?"

"You haven't been at the Hammerhead. I checked," Cor says and gestures to the chair without a tag. "Join me."

Prompto doesn't sit.

"Care for a drink?"

"I don't drink," Prompto says.

It's not completely true. He indulges in a beer or two every so often, but he hates being drunk. It brings out his surly, bitter, mean side.

"Relax. I don't want anything from you," Cor says. He looks tired. Old. "Except, perhaps your company if you're willing to entertain me for a while."

Cor withdraws a flask from his pocket and takes a swig. He winces, offers it to Prompto.

"At least drink a toast to the fallen," Cor says. "May they enjoy all the splendors of the afterlife."

Prompto relents and sits down. He's reminded of too many things as he checks out the camp stove and the tent. He takes the flask and swallows half a sip, almost gags, and passes it back to Cor.

It's only then he realizes what day it is. Three years ago, he lost everything that mattered.

All that's left are three sets of tags and an uncertain future.

He accepts another drink, then another, then Cor busts out a fresh bottle.

At first, there isn't much to say. Prompto's still wondering why he's here, and Cor seems to want to avoid the important subjects.

Prompto is good and drunk when he finally asks the question that's been on his mind for too many years to count.

"Did you know about me? What I am?"

"I knew," Cor says. "Me, and a handful of others."

"Are you the one that took me from the lab?"

Cor nods. Prompto waits for him to explain or elaborate or say something, but Cor falls into silence and continues to drink.

"Why me?"

"The plan as not to steal a baby," Cor says and he laughs softly. "Just information. You were the only one awake. You looked at me and I swear, you smiled."

He pauses to take another drink.

"We weren't supposed to see the experiments as human, but I couldn't walk away from you. That smile told me you were as human as I was." He passes the bottle to Prompto. "I knew better," he says, "but I took you, and justified it by saying you were technically information. It was important to know what they were working on."

Prompto is speechless. And very, very angry.

"So, what happened," he asks, "you changed your mind and dumped me off somewhere?"

"No one knew what you might become," he says. "I was... Reprimanded for it, and you were taken from me and placed with a family that agreed to monitor and care for you."

"Pshh. Yeah, well, they did a piss poor job of that," Prompto spits. "You should have left me there."

"I don't regret it," Cor says. "You have defied any and all expectations."

"Fuck that," Prompto says and shoots to his feet. He's had too much to drink and he knows it. "You have no idea what it was like having to hide my whole life, being terrified someone would find out! I had to lie to everyone I knew."

Cor nods and sips his booze.

"I don't regret it," he repeats.

"Shut up," Prompto says. "I've heard enough."

"I'm proud of you, Prompto," Cor says. "And maybe, in time you can forgive me for failing you."

Prompto sits down and buries his face in his hands. He should be grateful, but the alcohol has made him spiteful, and he bites down on his tongue until he tastes blood to stop himself from spitting out obscenities.

"Who else knew?" he asks after a while.

"My superior, one other Crownsguard, and... Gladiolus was informed after you completed your training," Cor says.

"To keep an eye on me, in case I turned."

"I didn't feel it was necessary, but my superior did. He didn't trust you," Cor says. "If Noctis hadn't insisted, you would not have been involved."

Gladio knew. He knew, and he never said a word. Not on the train. Not after.

Prompto's not sure if he should be really pissed about that, or really, really grateful Gladio kept his secret.

As the sun goes down, Prompto builds a fire, and they pass the bottle back and forth until Prompto can't drink anymore without getting sick.

"Guess you're my real dad," Prompto says to Cor with a drunken laugh, just before Cor passes out on the ground beside the fire.

* * *

It's midnight when Dave calls Cindy. He hasn't seen hide nor hair of him since Prompto took the job and he was due back hours ago.

According to Dave, it should have been a quick mission, there and back. Cindy wouldn't normally worry, but Prompto's only just returned.

"Do me a favor, wouldya?" Cindy asks. "Run out there and check for me, then call me back?"

"Anythin' for you, darlin'," Dave says.

He calls back thirty minutes later.

"You might wanna run out here with the tow truck," Dave says. "Boy's been drinkin' some kinda rotgut hooch and he's in the mood for fightin'."

"Wut?" Cindy drawls. "Prompto don't drink the hard stuff."

"Well, he has been tonight, and judgin' by the smell of 'em, he had a good ole time and took himself a bath in it."

" _Do not talk to the Goddess that way_ ," she hears Prompto say in the background. " _Disrespectful!_ "

"Oh, lordy," Cindy says. "I'll be on out. Where y'all at?"

Dave gives her the location and she drives out to find the Grease Monkey, still intact, parked on the side of the road. Prompto is perched precariously on the guard rail. His eyes are bloodshot in the truck's headlights and on his face is a hang-dog expression, but he smiles a dopey smile when she climbs from the cab.

He reeks of liquor.

"Cinnndeee," Prompto greets with a drunken giggle. He gets on his knees and crawls toward her, throws his arms around her legs and leans his cheek against her thigh. "It's the anniversary of my death."

"Aww, shit," Cindy says. "Forgot about that."

"Suppose you'll have'ta forgive him for it," Dave says. "He's got a good reason."

"S'pose he does," Cindy says. Prompto nuzzles her thigh and an electric thrill goes through her whole body. "Get up, sweetie."

"Nope," Prompto says. "I love you. Garage... grease goddess."

"You damn silly fool," she says, but she's amused. "Get up. Let's go home."


	7. Chapter 7

7.

* * *

Dave attempts to peel the drunken Prompto from Cindy's legs, but Prompto slaps at Dave with one hand and curls the other tighter around Cindy's knees.

"Stoppit," Prompto hisses. "Show some respect."

Dave and Cindy share a glance. Prompto is about twenty-five sheets to the wind, and as hard-headed as a behemoth. She strokes his head and he looks up at her with those sad puppy eyes of his.

"Prompto, sweetie, we gotta go home. It's late."

"Home is where the garage is," he says and closes his eyes. "The inner sanctum."

Cindy chuckles, no idea what he's on about. It won't be so funny for him in the morning, when he wakes up sick with a headache and a belly full of battery acid.

"Get up and I'll take you there," Cindy says.

"Yessss," Prompto says. "I must pay my respects. To... the gears."

"You get his arms, I'll get his legs," Dave says. "We'll wrestle him in there if we gotta."

Prompto howls and kicks Dave in the shin, jumps to his feet and takes a sloppy swing. He misses and spins around, in search of his target.

"Quit movin'," Prompto says. "I'm gonna fight you."

Dave holds up his hands and steps back.

"We ain't gonna fight, son. Jus' tryin' to get you home safe, that's all. Don't want no trouble."

"I _am_ trouble," Prompto declares. "You stay outta my face! I killed daemons way bigger'n you."

"Hoo boy," Cindy mutters. "Now I see why you stick to beer, sweetie. Come on, now. Let's get in the truck and get on back to the garage, okay?"

"I got these," he says and thrusts an handful of hunter's tags at her. "Cor's a better dad than my real one and my fake one all put together! Did you know that? Dude's like, immortal. It's like a superpower. He's unkillable!"

His earnest enthusiasm makes Cindy shake her head and smile. As drunk as he is, she sees shades of the old Prompto in his wide eyed, innocent babbling.

"Iggy was the best mom," Prompto slurs as he peers at one of the hunter's tags. "He taught me to shave the right way, you know? Noct never knew that. I never told him 'cause it's embarrassing. And the food! Oh god, I miss the food."

Cindy glimpses a name on one of the tags and shakes her head. No wonder he got drunk.

"Gladdy. I miss that big knuckle head," Prompto says. "Tough love. That was Gladdy. Wish I still had my pic... tures."

She wrangles him into the passenger seat and belts him in. He turns on the radio and sings along, content to be where he is for the time being.

"Thanks for findin' him," Cindy says to Dave as they hook up the car. "You know he don't mean it."

"I ain't always on my best behavior after a few," Dave says. "Said and done plenty of things I ain't too proud of."

"Haven't we all," Cindy agrees. "You have a good night, and thanks a bunch. Next oil change is on me, you hear?"

"Mighty sweet of you, Cindy," Dave says. "Give my regards to Cid next time you see him."

"Will do."

Back at home, Prompto stumbles into the living room and begins stripping off pieces of clothing on his way to the couch. A boot here, a shirt there, a sock in the kitchen, his belt on the recliner. He flops face down onto the couch with one boot still on, and three sets of dog tags clutched in his fist. The chains twist in his grip and he stares at them while they swing back and forth, like he's trying to hypnotize himself.

Cindy tugs off his remaining boot and sock, and covers him with the blanket. She crouches down beside him and brushes her fingers over a bruise on his cheek that wasn't there before.

"Where'd you get this?" she asks.

His lips curve into a smile.

"You love me," he says.

Before she can deny it, his eyes close and he begins to snore.

Three sets of dog tags dangle from his loosely closed palm. She leaves them where they are.

At least they found their way to the right person. Even if they're the last thing Prompto needs to see, at least he has something to hold onto.

* * *

Prompto wakes with a splitting headache and his guts feel like he drank a liter of sour milk. He lurches up from the couch, stumbles into the bathroom and retches over the toilet.

His memory of the night before is sketchy at best. He remembers most of his dealings with Cor and the metaphorical grenade he left at Prompto's feet, but not what was said to Cindy or Dave. He suspects he showed his ass, as he tends to do when he overindulges.

For a while, he lays on the cold tile and vows never to drink again. It's a promise he won't keep once the memory of this misery fades, but for now, alcohol is a dirty word.

He's still clutching the hunter's tags. They gleam in the bathroom light, letters stamped into tin.

The urge to vomit passes and he strings all three onto his own chain and slips it around his neck.

From now on, wherever he goes, his brothers go too.

* * *

Cor is in a booth at the diner when Prompto finally manages to pull himself together enough to eat something. He's not hungry, but he know from experience not eating will only make it worse. He orders toast and coffee, then debates whether or not to get his meal to go and leave Cor alone.

From the look of it, Cor's as bad off as he is, so Prompto chooses the company of a fellow miserable soul.

"Are you still angry?" Cor asks.

"Nah," Prompto says. "I'm not a very nice person when I drink."

"You don't say," Cor says.

"But, that stunt you pulled... luring me out there?" Prompto says. "Kind of a low blow."

"I'm sorry," Cor says. "You were hard to find."

Prompto picks at his toast and washes it down with the coffee. Neither settle his stomach, but his head is no longer pounding. He tugs the hunters tags out from under his shirt.

"Thanks for these, by the way," he says. "I know I was a dick last night, but I appreciate it."

"If anyone deserves to have them, it's you," Cor says.

"So what now?" Prompto asks. "You gonna disappear into the wild, or what?"

"I thought maybe I'd try my hand at country living," Cor says. "Live off the land. Hunt. Build myself a shack. The Crown City's a ruin and everyone's too busy fighting over who's next in line to be king. I want no part of that."

"Thought you were a loyal servant of Lucis," Prompto says.

"My loyalty died with Noctis," Cor says. "You're not the only one trying to rebuild their life."

"Yeah," Prompto says. "Seem's like everyone's just tryin' to figure it out."

Cor chuckles. "Before long, you'll sound native Leide."

"I don't have an accent," Prompto says and frowns. "Oh hell, it sneaks in there sometimes. When you hear it every day, just sorta happens."

"You adapt to your surroundings," Cor says.

"Had to, to survive."

"I know," Cor says. "I should be going, but I'd like to stay in touch. If you're willing. Maybe sometime we could hunt together."

Prompto decides he would like that, too.

"It would be an honor, Sir."

* * *

For the last couple of years, Paw-Paw's been in an elderly care facility just over the border in Duscae. It wasn't Cindy's idea, but Cid's. Monitoring his health is a full time job, and when he became too frail to look after himself, Cid made the arrangements himself. He refused to be a burden, and Cindy got no say in the matter.

She visits every week. Sometimes Cid's still the ornery old coot Cindy knows and loves, but mostly, he's just tired. Sometimes, he doesn't know who she is.

Today, though, his mind is sharp and his eyes are clear, even if his body is shriveled and weak. He can barely sit up on his own.

"We gotta talk, darlin'," he says after they get the pleasantries out of the way. "My time's comin' soon, and I gotta know what your plans are for the future."

"Same as always," Cindy says. "I'll keep runnin' the garage. I ain't gonna sell, if that's what you're worryin' about."

"That ain't what I'm worried about," Cid says. "It's you."

"Me? You ain't gotta worry 'bout me," she says. "I'm doin' fine. We've been real busy. Lotta good work comin' in."

"When you plan on settlin' down?" Cid says. "You ain't gonna be able to run it yourself forever. Once your hands start to knot up and your back ain't what it used to be, you're gonna need someone to keep it goin' for you."

Cindy turns her face away from her grandfather. This is her future. Someday her body will give out on her, the minor aches she feels today will cripple her in time. Her organs will fail and her sight will go. That time's coming sooner than she'd like, and like he says, there's no one to take her place when that day comes.

"You ain't getting' no younger, darlin'," Cid says gently. "I know, I know, you don't need the house and the kids and all that, and you done a mighty fine job runnin' the place, better than me, if you wanna know the truth. But it ain't everything."

"It's all I know," she says. "It's what I want."

"Ain't you lonely?" Cid asks.

"I ain't got time to be lonely," she says. "And Prompto's there to keep me company."

"Maybe you're just usin' bein' busy as an excuse to keep everyone away," Cid says. "I done see you doin' it, girl. Don't you lie to me. And as far as that boy goes, it's time you cut him loose and send him along if you ain't plannin' to be with him."

Cindy shakes her head. "It ain't like that."

"It is so," Cid says. "That boy's head over heels in love with you, and I'm thinkin' you love him back but you're scared, so you're just gonna push him away until he leaves, to prove you were right all along. That everyone eventually leaves."

Her eyes fill with tears and she opens her mouth to snap back at him, but he isn't wrong.

"If you don't love him, you ain't doin' him no favors keepin' him around just 'cause you don't wanna be alone," Cid says. "An' I understand if you ain't interested in gettin' hitched and havin' babies. No one says you gotta, but you need to think about what happens when you're old and who's gonna be there when you can't do it on your own."

"I'll take on an apprentice," she says.

"If that's what works for you," Cid says, "but... there is such a thing as bein' too focused. I know you love what you do, and you're damn good at it, but it can't be the only thing you got. That's a long, lonely road, darlin', and it ain't one I recommend for you."

* * *

It's late when Cindy returns to the garage. So late, Prompto almost called to find out what was keeping her.

He can tell something is wrong. She doesn't look him in the eye as she sets a six-pack of Leide Ale on the work table.

"Starting to worry you broke down or something," Prompto says. "You okay?"

She nods, opens two beers and passes one to him.

"Will you walk with me?" she asks.

He'd follow her to the ends of the earth if she asked.

"Sure," he says.

They don't go far. Just to the wall behind the shop, facing the desert. She sits and drinks her beer and she looks so lost, Prompto is tempted to hug her.

"You want kids, Prompto?" she asks.

Her question takes him by surprise. It's not something he's thought about in a long time. He's made his peace with it, but he brushes his fingers over the bar code and wishes things were different.

"I used to," he says. "But, it's not going to happen for me, so..."

"How come?" she asks.

"Guess the Empire didn't want to take any chances we might reproduce," he says. "They made us sterile."

"As in...?" She lifts an eyebrow.

Prompto laughs softly, but he's glad for the darkness that covers his blush.

"Everything works like it's supposed to. Just, not that."

"I'm sorry," she says. "I shouldn'a asked."

"It's okay," he says. "I've known for a long time."

He takes a swallow of his beer and glances at her from the corner of his eye.

"Why did you ask?" he wonders.

"Just somethin' Paw-Paw said today," she says. "He's right. I ain't gettin' no younger. Probably too late anyway."

She draws her knees up to her chest and wraps her arms around her legs.

"I just always thought there'd be plenty of time, you know?" she said. "And then the ruin came on an' there was other things to be done. I didn't really think about it much."

Prompto doesn't know what to say, or where she's going with this conversation, but he wants that look on her face to go away.

"You... don't think I'm usin' you, do you?" she asks.

"Using me?" he asks. "For what?"

"I dunno," she says. "Help. Company. Free labor."

"Well, if you're using me, I'm using you back," he says. "Which is, sort of how friendships work, right? Keep each other company, help each other out?"

"Yeah. I guess so," she says. "You ain't mad you ain't getting more out of it?"

More? What more was there? It was enough of a miracle he got to be her friend and confidant.

"I don't want anything out of it you're not willing to give, Cin," he says.

"You never wondered what that'd be like?"

"I thought about it from time to time," he says with a shrug. It's such a lie. He would sell his soul to have his feelings returned. "What about you? Have you...?"

"Wondered about you and me?" she says. "Sure, I think about it."

It stuns him to know that. He can't imagine why she would.

"You do?" he asks. "Why? Guy like me doesn't have much to offer."

Cindy finishes her beer and sets the bottle aside.

"You really think so little of yourself?" she asks. Her knuckles brush along his jaw and he aches for all the promises her touch holds. "You don't think I could ever love you back?"

Prompto can't speak. He can hardly breathe. He bows his head and shakes it, no, never in his wildest dreams.

"Well, then," she says. "I guess I'm just gonna have to love you enough for the both of us."


	8. Chapter 8

8.

* * *

Prompto has always revered women.

They're all beautiful to him, each in their own way. Tall, short, slender, athletic, curvy; they're all worthy of admiration.

He looks at them with the eye of the photographer, through a lens, a filter, and loves them for all the things that men are not.

His eye for beautiful things is a formidable match for his reptilian brain's baser instincts. His respect for women is far greater than his desire to touch and be touched, even if he is starved for it.

He's known his share of women. There were ten long years where there was little to do but fight back the darkness. There were a lot of lonely souls that sought the same comforts in that darkness as he did. Sometimes for a day, a week, a month, maybe two, before comfort wasn't enough and they went their separate ways.

Skirt-chaser. Flirt. Girl-crazy. Lover-boy. Names assigned to him that were only half right. It was more than sex that drove him.

He long ago let go of any hope of something beyond friendship between them, content to admire them from afar. Most of his boyhood fantasies were romantic in nature, and far less sexual than anyone might expect from a man of twenty. Back then, his affection starved soul craved a kind touch over and above all else.

Back then, he fell in love so easily. Or in what he thought was love. All those countless crushes, most of them fleeting.

He knows better now, that all those infatuations were on the unattainable ones, by design. Always women he could worship from a distance, where it was safe, where he couldn't be hurt. It only reinforced the idea of being undeserving and unworthy of their affection.

It's always been the confident, independent women that to bring him to his knees. They are his weakness, these untouchable goddesses.

So many women in the world, he used to wish he could love them all. Now, there's only one who has his undivided attention.

He's never thought about what he would do if she ever loved him back. Never believed it was possible.

In his fantasies, the next step was easy. This, reality, it's so much harder. He's paralyzed, speechless, half sick and burning up on the inside.

"Guess I must've misread you," she says.

"...no," he says, voice gone, "you didn't."

His hold breaks and he drags her face to his and kisses her. Too hard, not sweetly like he intended, but with heat and fire. Her response is immediate, passionate, and her mouth is soft, so soft against his, he's sure this can't be real. This is a dream he's going to wake up from, alone and in the dark, aching for the comfort of someone's arms around him.

Cindy breaks away too soon and leans her forehead to his. Her breath comes in soft pants and her fingers tighten around his bicep. He can't help but touch his lips to hers again.

"We should go inside," she says.

He carries her inside chocobo-back style, his arms hooked under her knees and her arms around his neck. She laughs at this unexpected silliness and tells him to giddyup, but she's doing her best to distract him, lips against his jaw, fingers in his hair.

It's working. If he's unable to focus, her teasing will prove his undoing, and he can't afford to rush this. Tonight, now, he wants to savor every second, every touch, every kiss, every taste, in case he never gets another shot.

She invites him into her lair, where he's never dared go before. She's beautiful in the lamplight, her hair a soft halo of amber, her eyes full of fire. He takes her in his arms and kisses her, tenderly this time, cautiously, sweetly, and she presses into him, hungry for more. Every caress of her fingertips makes him gasp.

He goes slow, agonizingly slow, and touches her the way she deserves to be touched. They make out on the bed like teenagers, shedding clothing a piece at a time. He memorizes all the places that make her moan, kisses his way along every plane of her body. He teases, touches, kisses, until she's shaking, panting, until she murmurs _please_.

Then and only then does he give in. The first thrust is shallow, and Prompto nearly loses control when she cries out. The second, he captures her lips and goes deeper, and her cry becomes a moan.

It's tender, sensual and unhurried. Prompto keeps his eyes on her face and knows there's nothing else for him, no better place for him than here with her, and no one else he will love the way he loves her.

Best friend. Companion. Confidant. Lover. Goddess. He gives her all of himself, pours his heart and soul into loving her.

Tenderness gives way to passion at her urging and he feels that telltale throbbing inside her, a fluttering, a shudder, and her fingers dig into his shoulder blades. He feels her coming undone and it's the end of his self-control.

It's a thousand times better than any of his youthful fantasies. A thousand times more than he ever expected. In this moment, she's more beautiful than he's ever seen her, bathed in lamplight, her face a picture of ecstasy and her guard broken. He wants to take a picture of her like this, to immortalize how beautiful she is, to remember the flush in her cheeks and the golden-amber shimmer in her hair.

She is beautiful. She is a goddess. And she loves him.

He is shattered by how quickly it comes on him, and he buries his cry against her neck. It leaves him breathless, spent, weak and shaking in her arms with his heart thumping in his ears and mist in his eyes.

As it fades, he relaxes into her embrace and lets his head rest against her collarbone. She traces circles against his shoulder and arm with light fingertips. It feels just as good as the rest.

"You're just freckled all over, ain't ya?" she says.

Prompto laughs and props himself up above her, combs his fingers through her hair, and falls in love all over again. He suspects it won't be the last time she steals his heart right out of his chest, and he doesn't mind a bit.

"Yep," is the best response he can manage.

"I guess you got no business bein' on my couch no more," she says.

He loves the way she's looking at him now, with soft eyes, a half smile.

"It's cool," he says. "I don't mind bunking in the camper."

"Not when I got room for two," she says and bops him on the nose with the tip of her finger. Prompto nips at it and she laughs. "Why do you gotta be so sweet?"

"Design flaw," he says, but he smiles.

She presses closer and Prompto notices her shoulders are almost as freckled as his. He kisses one, then the other then returns his mouth to her lips for one more taste.

"I love you," she says.

"Yeah?" he asks and brushes a fingertip across her bottom lip.

"Yep," she says.

He takes her hand, presses his lips to her palm, and bows his head in deference to his goddess.

* * *

Cindy's never had a man love her so unselfishly before. Most have put their needs before hers, but Prompto's different. He never leaves her wanting, never treats her like she's there to please him, and she goes to sleep knowing he will still be there when she wakes up.

He's not afraid to play. Whatever she wants, however she wants it, he's eager to give it.

When she comes to bed late, he folds her up in his arms with a sleepy sigh and a smile, and never complains of neglect. He's protective, but he knows when to back off, and he still loves that she loves her work.

"I think I'd freak out if you smelled like anything besides the garage," he says when she asks if he minds. "It just wouldn't be right."

She loves him for that, and for a thousand other little things. How he tries to cook simple meals to spare them from the monotonousness of food from the diner. The way he takes her picture when she's least expecting it. How his smile and good humor is slowly coming back. The way he turns to her in the dark after a bad dream.

Little about their relationship changes besides, and Cindy's glad for that. He lets her be when she's working, he does his own thing or helps out when he doesn't have a hunt or delivery to make. They still play cards in the evenings, or listen to the radio, or go for drives down dirt roads where there's no light to pollute the night sky.

She teaches him to weld when work is slow, and he picks up the basics quickly. There's no shortage of scrap metal lying around to practice on and he spends his off time getting it right.

"You don't gotta do that for me, you know," she says when she finds him out back cutting a sheet of metal into perfect squares. "I just showed you 'cause we was bored."

He lifts the mask and frowns at her.

"I know," he says. "I actually like it, though. Helps me focus, even if all I'm doing is ruining good scrap metal."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah," he says.

"So long as you're doin' it for yourself and not me," she says.

Three weeks later, he presents her with a hand made sign for the garage, the letters cut from rusted fenders, hoods, siding and various other bits left to ruin in the desert, some still bearing faded and chipped paint. They dangle from a length of pipe and move on the breeze, like a wind chime.

She loves it. She loves the way he loves her and the way he does things like this without being asked, simply to make her smile.

"Happy birthday," he says.

"Don't remind me. I'm officially old," she says and surveys the place for the best spot to hang his gift. "Soon I'm gonna be all wrinkled and ugly and my hair's gonna turn gray. Ain't fair that men just keep gettin' handsomer when they're old and we ladies just sag all over the place."

"Don't care," he says. He rests his chin on his hand and gives her that adoring look. "You'll still be a knock-out."

"You say that now," she says. Then, she points to a beam just inside the door. "Let's hang it up here, where everyone can see it."

The sign is the birth of something else, another hobby that Prompto turns into cash, alongside the photos he now sells prints of in the shop. He makes signs and wind chimes out of scrap and they sell faster than he can make them. Spark plugs, gears, discarded silverware, glass bottles, anything and everything he can scavenge from the desert.

Sometimes she sees his barcode and thinks of what he could have been, but it's hard to picture him as anything but what he is. Not a killer at heart, not cold, not unkind, just Prompto Argentum and his sweet, talented, loving soul.

* * *

Cid's heart is failing. He's going fast, they say, but he's asking for her.

Prompto drives Cindy out to Duscae, and he tries to keep the mood light. Cindy appreciates that, but she's already mourning the loss. Her eyes start to leak every so often but she's keeping it together as best as she can. Prompto finally lapses into silence as they cross the border, but he takes her hand and holds on.

Cid's on a respirator. His face is ashen and his eyes are dull. Cindy can tell, he's ready to stop fighting.

He lifts his hand, reaches for her, but the effort is too much. Cindy kisses dry, papery knuckles, and fights the urge to sob. He raised her. Taught her his craft. Gave her the best life he could and loved her without question. He was all she had for so many years and she's terrified of losing him.

He must've been waiting for her. He tries to smile behind the respirator, gives her hand one last squeeze, and then he's gone.

In a daze, she makes arrangements, says goodbye one last time. She's gone numb, but she regrets not spending more time with him in his final days.

She retreats to her room when they get home and sits on the edge of the bed. Prompto is in the kitchen, brewing tea. Only then does she allow herself to cry. It's just a trickle at first, then the floodgates open. He's only been gone a few hours and she already misses him.

He seats himself on the bed beside her. He doesn't say anything as he folds her up in a tight embrace. He knows what this is like. There are no words that help.

Cindy sobs against his chest and he holds her tighter, his face buried in her hair. It hurts, oh how it hurts, but it feels good to be held. It feels good to let it out and not be judged for it.

"Can't believe he's really gone," she says.

It makes the tears overflow again, and Prompto keeps holding on and doesn't let go until she's the one who pulls away.

He draws a hand over her hair. His eyes are red from crying with her.

"Want something to eat?" he asks.

"I could use a stiff drink if it's all the same to you," she says.

On the nightstand is a photo of her with Cid when she was young. He's got his arm hooked around her neck, his eyes bright with pride as they stand before the first car Cindy ever rebuilt herself. She was fourteen and awkward, with skinny chocobo legs and a goofy smile.

She picks it up and looks at it as Prompto returns to the bedroom with a glass and a bottle. He pours her drink and hands it to her, then smiles at the picture.

"Look at you," he says. "You're so cute."

She takes a swallow of the liquor, pauses and then finishes it. It burns on the way down but it dulls the sharp pain in her chest. She sets the photo aside and rubs her eyes.

"What do you need me to do?" he asks. "What can I help with?"

"Guess I should be makin' some calls," she says. "Think you could keep an eye on things 'round the garage? I ain't gonna be able to fix nothin' for a few days, so if you could field any calls and maybe finish up the small stuff?"

"Whatever you need," he promises. "All you gotta do is ask."

* * *

Fewer people show up for Cid's funeral than Prompto expects. Most of the people Cid knew have already passed on, victims of war, the scourge, or old age. Those that do arrive to pay their respects are either elderly or friends of Cindy's, but Iris and Cor both make an appearance, too.

Cindy gives a brief but loving eulogy, and Prompto is proud of the strength he hears in her voice. She doesn't waver. She doesn't burst into tears. She holds it together better than Prompto ever could.

At the end of the service, shots of Cid's favorite liquor are poured and passed around. Cindy takes two. She drinks one, and pours the second into the dirt above Cid's grave.

"Hope you got a garage in the afterlife, Paw Paw," she says. "Hope it's the best you ever seen."

She turns toward the desert, and for a second, her face crumples, but she collects herself like a champ to accept condolences and hugs and handshakes from the line of well wishers awaiting her attention. Prompto stands aside, but close enough that if she needs him, he'll be there.

Cor greets him again with a nod.

"You and Cindy must be close," Cor observes. "You haven't taken your eyes off her for an hour."

"We're family," Prompto says. "We look out for each other."

"I'm glad to hear it," Cor says. "She'll need a friend to help her through this."

"Well, don't plan on goin' anywhere."

"Listen, there's a hunt I'd like you to join me on," Cor says. "Not today, but soon. Come find me when you're ready."

Prompto's curious, but his duty is here with Cindy.

It's almost ten by the time the last visitor leaves. Cindy waves as the car drives away, but as soon as the tail lights fade into the darkness, her posture changes and her shoulders droop. Her smile falls away and she looks at Prompto with a tired and mournful gaze.

"You did good today, Cin," he says and tucks a lock of hair behind her ear. "Forgot to eat again, though. Can't keep doing that."

"It all tastes like gravel," she says.

He remembers that. For a while it all tasted like plain oatmeal to him. Even his beloved favorites held no appeal.

"Wanna grab something from the diner?" he asks.

"Naw," she says. "I'll choke somethin' down in the mornin'."

She's staring at him, her lips parted like she wants to say something.

"What do you need, Cin?" he asks.

She blinks a few times and lays a hand against his chest.

"You," she says. "I need you."

"You got me," he says. "I'm not going anywhere."

She steps into his personal space, her face just inches from his, and her arms snake around his neck. His heart starts pounding before his brain processes what's happening, and it never gets old, the way she makes his heart flutter in his chest.

She's so close. She smells of dry earth and something sweet instead of motor oil. He likes that too, but he misses the scent of the garage on her skin.

He recognizes the look in her eye. It's raw need, and he's familiar with the urge to find someone to hold onto for comfort and release. There were ten long years of darkness, ten long years of not knowing which day might be his last. Ten years of fighting and bloodshed and death. He knows that look.

"Whatever you want, Cin," he says, his voice low and hoarse. "I'm all yours."


	9. Chapter 9

9.

* * *

It's been raining for days.

There's a traffic advisory out to avoid the roads in Leide due to flooding. The only work right now is the occasional call to rescue a motorist who chose to ignore the warning and wound up stranded.

Cindy doesn't mind the lack of work so much. She's never taken a real break before, never tried to sleep in, but it's nice, not having anywhere to be.

They lay together, tangled up in the sheets, listening to the rain on the roof. Every now and then, thunder rattles the windows. Cindy's never liked thunderstorms much. Lightning from a distance is beautiful, but storms remind her the bigger things in life are beyond her control.

"I'm gonna run over to the diner for some breakfast," Prompto says. "You want something?"

"Just coffee," she mumbles and settles back into her own pillow.

He leaves her with a kiss and the sound of the rain against the window lulls her back to sleep. When she wakes again, it's to the tell-tale click of Prompto's camera shutter and the scent of fresh coffee.

She opens an eye and looks at him from her nest of sheets. He sits cross-legged on the end of the bed, his face hidden by the camera. He adjusts the lens and snaps another.

"Nobody wants pictures of my mornin' face."

"Your morning face is the best," he says.

Cindy throws his pillow at him. He dodges with a laugh and tugs the sheet down a little lower, exposing her shoulder and a hint of breast.

"Noooo," she whines. "Too early for all that. What are you gonna do with those, anyway?"

"Sell 'em to the magazines," he says with a hint of a smile. "I'll make you famous, baby."

Cindy laughs at his posh accent and stretches like a cat, aware of the soft clicks from the camera as she does so.

"Put that down and get over here," she says.

"Nope," he says. "Gotta immortalize this moment."

"What moment?"

"The one and only time the amazing Cindy Aurum slept past sunrise," he teases. "It's one for the history books, folks."

"Fine," she says and settles back down. "Snap away, Mr. Photog, but you better not show those to no one, ya hear?"

His smile is broad and toothy. It takes ten years off his face and Cindy is reminded of that sweet, energetic boy that walked onto her lot in the company of royalty so many years ago. He's changed so much, but it warms her heart to see that boy still exists.

"The guys at the hunter's camp are gonna be so excited."

Cindy shoots him a look, though she knows he's not serious.

Prompto's smile falls away and he lowers the camera.

"These are just for me," he says. "Promise."

"They better be," Cindy mumbles and turns on her side to really look at him.

He's almost thirty-five and still has a baby face and freckles, but that faint scar across the bridge of his nose, the slight lump on the right side where he got it broken when he was twenty hints at a less charmed past than his boyish appearance might suggest.

There are other scars that don't show, inside and out from days of hunting, burns and cuts and abrasions, and Cindy has seen them all. They only make him more beautiful in her eyes.

She thinks about what Cid said before he died. She isn't lonely with Prompto here and she can't picture her life without him in it.

Prompto snaps another photo and Cindy knows she won't find a better more devoted, patient, talented, or kind man anywhere in the world.

Maybe, Cid's right. Maybe, the next step is a no-brainer.

He tugs the sheet down further and Cindy's exposed from the waist up, but she doesn't mind. She trusts that no one will ever see these photos except Prompto, and that they will be arty and beautiful, even if she _is_ old.

"Say fuzzy pickles," he says and Cindy laughs.

"I ain't sayin' that," she says. "Sounds filthy."

Prompto's smile is all she can see of his face. She loves him, so why not?

"So, when are you plannin' on makin' an honest woman of me, Prompto?"

His lips part and he slowly lowers the camera to stare at her in that awed way of his. He blinks a few times and his jaw trembles but he doesn't say a word.

"Don't go havin' a stroke on me, now," she says. "Just a thought I been havin' lately."

"You... you really want to?" he asks.

"Don't see why not," she says. "Unless you plan on leavin' me. Figure we been shackin' up long enough. Might as well make it official."

He shakes his head, smiles, wipes his eyes, and sets the camera on the nightstand.

"So is that a yes?"

"Yeah," he says, his voice gone hoarse and an octave lower. "Yeah. I'll marry you."

* * *

Prompto forgets all about his promise to help Cor with the hunt until he shows up at the Hammerhead in a rusty, beat up truck that backfires as he pulls into the lot.

"Bet you miss the Lucian fleet, huh?" Prompto says.

Cor pats the battered hood. "She has her charms, but I do miss those leather seats."

Prompto chuckles. "And the turbo booster."

"That too," Cor says. "Working air con was also nice. Wouldn't be so bad if I could put the top down."

"Yikes," Prompto says. "Sorry, dude. Want Cindy to take a look at it?"

"Perhaps another day," Cor says. "Still interested in that hunt I mentioned?"

"Sure," Prompto says, but he wonders what kind of hunt Cor can't handle on his own. "What's the mark?"

"That's best left for later," Cor says. "Once my associate arrives, we'll discuss the details."

"Must be big if you need this much help," Prompto says.

Cor nods, and his gaze fixes on the table and chairs next to the garage door. Cid's jacket hangs from the chair on the right, his favorite wrench on the table next to it. Cor inhales, exhales, and hangs his head. It hasn't been so long since Cid passed that they don't all still feel it.

"I'm going to grab a bite to eat," Cor says. "I'll let you know when she arrives."

"Take your time. I'll be in the garage."

Cindy's on the phone, her long legs clad in jeans. She is self-conscious of the difference in their ages, sometimes says she's too old for him, and is convinced every new wrinkle will send him off in search of someone on the better side of youth.

All he sees is a strong, smart woman he loves beyond reason. If she's aging, he doesn't notice and doesn't care. Her looks are only part of the attraction.

He kisses her temple and slides a hand over her hip. She pushes his hand away, but gives him a smile that promises more later.

"I understand," she says into the phone. "We'll figure somethin' out."

Prompto returns to his worktable, where the pieces of an old transponder are spread out. He sits and tries to make sense of the dated technology. It should be simple, but he's perplexed by the mass of wires and ancient circuit board.

Cindy sits on the stool beside him and watches as he solders the end of a wire to a contact on the board.

"My cousin's sick," she says. "Real sick. Maybe the dyin' kind of sick."

Prompto looks up and sets aside the soldering gun. "Cousin?"

"We ain't close, barely related, like third or fourth cousin or somethin'," Cindy says. "We only met once, back when I was a kid, but she's got two little ones and her husband got the scourge back durin' the ruin. She ain't got no other family but me."

"What's she gonna do?" Prompto asks. "You gonna go see her?"

Cindy nods and picks up a dry-rotted plastic frequency knob. She turns it over and frowns at the cracks, then sets it back on the table.

"I can't let those little girls be on their own," she says. "It ain't right. We're family, after all."

Prompto lays a hand to her knee and squeezes.

"You gonna be okay if we gotta take them in?" she asks.

"Of course," he says. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"You sure?"

Prompto takes both of her hands in his and holds on. Half a generation of children have been lost to war and scourge. The ones left are precious.

"We'll need a bigger place," he says. "They can't all sleep on the couch."

"S'pose we could put 'em up at the camper," she says. "Maybe... let 'em use Cid's place."

Neither set foot in Cid's private spaces since before the funeral. Cindy couldn't bear it, and it wasn't Prompto's place to investigate. Better to use it than turn it into a shrine, but Prompto has a better idea.

He tugs her to her feet and leads her away from the table to the open garage door and points to the hallowed hill above.

"We'll build a house," he says and takes the Hammerhead cap off her head and puts it on his own. "Right there, with a big window so you can always take in the view."

"You remember."

"Yep," he says. "I remember."

Her arms slip around his waist and she leans her head against his shoulder. He lays a hand against her hair and breathes in her familiar scent as the thought of family, however makeshift, spawns ten-thousand butterflies in his belly.

"That sounds real nice," she says. "Maybe with a big ole porch we can sit on and look at the stars."

"Let's do it, Cin," he says. "Bet Dave knows some guys lookin' for work."

"I'll give Holly a call, too," Cindy says as she pulls away. "See if she don't know nobody who knows somethin' about buildin' houses."

He settles her cap back on her head. Blonde curls stick out from the sides beneath it and frame her face in gold.

"It ain't gonna be easy, you know," she says. "Those girls are gonna be heartbroken if their mama dies."

Prompto brushes his thumb over her chin and steals a peck on the lips.

"I know," he says. "Guess that means we'll just have to love them harder, huh?"

Cindy's eyes search his face for a minute. "You're a good man, Prompto."

He mimes retching and Cindy slaps his arm.

"If I gotta say it a thousand times for you to know it, then I'm gonna," she says.

"I just try to do what's right," he says. "That's all."

His hands settle on her waist and he's over the moon that she wants a future with him. It's so overwhelming, he can't resist stealing another kiss.

As he pulls back, a familiar figure catches his eye. How long she's been watching, he's not sure, but her presence leaves him at a loss for words. The last time he saw her was before then end of the darkness, in Lestallum.

"Long time, no see Blondie."

"Aranea?"

"The one and only," she says. "You look good."

He knows he doesn't. His hair is flat and a little unkempt, his shirt has holes along the seams, and his hands are coated in dust from the transponder. He feels like an eight year old under her scrutiny, a kid caught rolling in mud puddles by his mother.

"You look incredible," he says and he means it. She's ten years older than he is, but could pass for thirty-five. "How have you been? _Where_ have you been?"

"I'd ask the same of you," she says and flicks her eyes at Cindy, "but I already have my answer. It's good to see you again, Cindy."

"Likewise," Cindy says. "It's been what, six years?"

"Seven," Aranea says. "So sorry to hear about Cid. He was a cantankerous old fart, but I always appreciated his sass."

Cindy smiles. "That he was. So, what can we do you for?"

"Cor asked me to meet him," she says and tips her head at Prompto. "I hear the three of us are going on a hunt."

"Yeah, he failed to mention you were his associate," Prompto says.

"Is that going to be a problem?"

"Nah," he says with a smile. "Been way too long since we busted stuff up together."

"I'm actually looking forward to that."

Being in the presence of two of his boyhood crushes at the same time is strange. Back then, he never really believed he had a shot with either. While he still finds Aranea attractive enough to make him nervous, there is only one of them he wants and only one who wants him in return.

"Cor's at the diner," Prompto says.

"Shall we, then?"

Prompto turns to Cindy. "Be back in a bit."

"Take your time," she says. "Got plenty of work waitin' on me."

He leaves her with a gentle kiss and a smile and follows Aranea across the lot.

"Cindy Aurum, huh?" she says. "That's an awful lot of woman, Shortcake. Sure you can handle it?"

Prompto smirks. "She wants me to marry her, so I'd say it's all good."

"Aren't you the smug one," Aranea says. "Maybe I underestimated you."

"You had your chance," he teases. "Too late now. I'm taken."

"I'm crushed."

Prompto laughs and ushers her inside the diner. Cor sits at the last table on the right, his hands curled around a cup of coffee. He greets them with a nod and waves his hands at the empty booth across from him.

"So, what's this about?" Prompto asks. "The three of us seems like overkill."

"There have been reports of Magitek Troopers near Costlemark Tower," Cor says. "There may be a lot of them, if our source is to be believed."

"So what? They're pushovers," Prompto says.

"They're sentient," Aranea says.

"What do you mean, _sentient_?"

They both stare at him and wait for it to sink in.

When it does, Prompto feels like he's been kicked in the guts.

Not just robots implanted into the bodies of throwaway mass-produced soldiers, but living beings with minds and thoughts of their own. At least partially human, as human as a clone can be.

He looks from one to the other. Neither face provides the answer he's looking for.

"How did they get there?" Prompto asks. "It's been a long time since the Nifs made any. Shouldn't they all be, you know, dead?"

"Best guess, these are the ones left behind after the war," Cor says. "The Empire abandoned them once the darkness fell, most were left under Ardyn's command. Some went rogue. Perhaps the ones that didn't overload and self destruct became self-aware."

Prompto can't imagine that. Without maintenance, how could they have survived?

"So, what do you want from me?"

"If they're a threat, we need your help to eliminate it."

"And if they're not?"

"Might be best to take care of it anyway," Aranea says. "It's not like they'll ever be functioning, productive members of society. I'm surprised they've survived this long, considering the only thing they were ever taught was how to swing an ax or point a gun and shoot."

Prompto nods his head, not in agreement, but out of habit. If the MT's have minds and feelings, it won't be so easy for him to pull the trigger. Life isn't something he can take and throw away without remorse. Especially when he sees the MT's in a different light than the rest.

He is fortunate. He is what any of the MT's could have become. One twist of fate and he could be in their shoes. Aranea and Cor know that better than anyone.

So why ask him along?

"Okay," he says. "I'll go."

"Good," Cor says. "It's settled. We leave in the morning."

* * *

 _Notes: Not sure if I'll continue updating here or not. Reader traffic is really, really low compared to Ao3. That might be because I update there first, or it might just be because the audience here is different, and that's fine. But I'm not sure if I should save myself the trouble of publishing on both sites and update exclusively on Ao3 from now on, or if I should continue here for the sake of having a back-up/cross-post in case something happens. I'll play it by ear, I guess._

 _Anyway, I just wanted to say thanks to those that are reading, and most especially to the readers that have left feedback so far. Might not always get the time to respond, but I appreciate every review I've gotten so far. :)_

 _If anyone is interested, I've started another story called "Dogs And Angels." There are 3 chapters up here, and I'll be updating it on ao3 on Thurs or Fri every week. Username on ao3 is MythHighwind._

 _Thanks again for reading!_


	10. Chapter 10

A/N: Okay, so I wasn't really aware there are some readers that only read here, and honestly thought I was just double posting by updating this story both here and AO3 but some of you guys let me know that isn't true, so I'll continue updating this on both sites. Dogs and Angels, however I may only update on AO3.

Thanks for reading!

10.

* * *

Prompto is quiet after his meeting with Cor and Aranea. It reminds Cindy of the way he was before he took off, and she spends the afternoon worried he won't return after the hunt is done.

He won't talk about it. He works on his project, but gets frustrated and walks out around dinnertime, the parts of the transistor left scattered across the table.

Cindy follows and finds him halfway down the hill behind the Hammerhead, beneath the water tower, his back to home and his face to the sky.

"Prompto, what's goin' on with you?" she asks. "You ain't been right all day."

He stares at a pile of torn down fencing leftover from the ruin.

"We should really get rid of that," he says. "It's an eyesore."

"That ain't what you're twisted about," Cindy says. "Don't change the subject."

He shakes his head, but she notices the way he rubs that mark on his wrist, even if he doesn't notice himself doing it.

"This about your friends?" she asks. "Or the hunt?"

"It's just me," he says. "Thinking too much. Making too big a deal of things, like always."

"You gonna tell me what happened?"

"It's... don't worry about it," he says and forces a smile. "Got it covered."

He's lying, but Cindy can't make him talk about it if he isn't ready to.

"You ain't getting cold feet, now are ya?" she teases.

He smiles, for real this time, and rests his hands on her hips.

"Never."

Cindy hugs him because she doesn't know what else to do, and the firmness of his return embrace is enough to ease her fears. He'll come back.

* * *

Prompto is still awake when Cindy comes home earlier than usual, but still late enough for the hour to be called indecent. She showers and emerges from the bath clean, her skin warm and soft when she slips into the bed beside him.

"Figured you'd be out by now," she says.

"Just thinking," he says. "Hey Cin? What happened to the people who became daemons after the sun came back? Did they die?"

"You don't remember?"

"I wasn't really too with it back then," he says. "Didn't really pay attention."

Cindy props her head up on her palm and looks down at him.

"Well, most of 'em died, I s'pose," she says. "Though I heard stories about a few goin' back the way they was before they got infected. Guess if they weren't afflicted with the disappearin', they got to be human again. Can't say if it's true or not. Never met one who came back, but sometimes I hear stories."

Prompto ponders that and wonders if Niflheim's human-robot-daemon army was subject to the same. The MT's were not true daemons, but infused with their essence, fueled by their power, and kept in line by the darkness. He always figured that when the scourge lifted, the remaining MT army fell.

"Think that's really possible?" he asks.

"If there's one thing I've learned over the years," she says, "it's that anything's possible."

* * *

Prompto's dreams are filled with Magitek Troopers with missing limbs and familiar faces. They bleed darkness and swing their axes and call out to him to come home, to the lab where he belongs. When he wakes, he's not rested, and he dreads the hunt ahead of him.

It's hard to shake the past when it just keeps coming back to haunt him. He wonders if he'll ever be able to let it go, or if life will just keep on reminding him of where he came from.

He dresses and gathers his best arsenal before Cindy is even awake. He brews a pot of coffee and fills two Hammerhead travel mugs to the brim as she wanders into the kitchen, still half asleep, to blindly reach for his offered liquid boost.

"Thanks, darlin'," she says.

He presses a kiss to her temple and another to her forehead and is rewarded with a sleepy smile.

"I'll be gone a few days," he says. "But, you call me if you need me okay?"

"I'll be fine. Work's kinda slow," she says. "I'm gonna drive out to Old Lestallum and see my cousin. Maybe drop in on Holly. Pick up a few parts."

She yawns and Prompto wonders if he should tell Cor to get bent, stay home, and help out.

"Maybe I shouldn't go," he says. "You need me here -"

"You go take care of whatever's got you all worked up," she says. "No sense in avoidin' it."

It's not the first time Cindy saw straight through him, but he's still surprised.

"Now, I told Cor if he brings you back drunk or messed up, he was gonna find out what I can do with my favorite wrench besides fix cars with it," she says. "And I don't know what y'all got goin' on, but I can tell it's somethin' you gotta do, so you go do it, and I'll go do what I gotta."

Prompto folds her up in a tight hug and vows this will be his last hunt.

* * *

Prompto rides in the bed of Cor's truck and watches the landscape pass. There's still plenty of evidence of the ruin in the countryside, though most of the towns were quick to rebuild. Farms and houses fell to the ruin and many remain that way, but there's even more evidence of growth now than there was a year ago. Businesses are open, the fields filled with crops, and new homes dot the landscape.

It's a rebirth Prompto scarcely noticed in the years since the scourge, but it gives him hope that maybe mankind is not doomed after all. It gives him some peace to know Noctis' sacrifice was not in vain, that King Regis didn't sell his Kingdom for a Prince.

They make camp at sundown a few miles from the tower. Aranea cooks, and to Prompto's delight, the recipe she uses is one familiar to him.

"I haven't had this in years," he says. "This was one of Ignis' specialties."

"Where do you think I learned it?" she asks.

"I didn't know you guys were friendly," Prompto says.

"I wouldn't say friendly. More like... We had an understanding," she says, "and a lot of downtime. He showed me a few things."

Prompto's grateful for it, even if it makes him miss Ignis something terrible. He savors the spicy grilled meat and wishes he'd paid more attention to cooking, instead of just being the guy that faithfully set the table.

"He was quite the intellectual," Aranea says as she joins them around the fire. "I enjoyed his company."

"Yeah," Prompto agrees, but he wonders if there wasn't something more than just cooking lessons involved. "He was the smart one. Terrible jokes, though."

"The worst," she agrees. "I hate puns."

Cor is quiet and he watches Prompto from his chair, an enigma as always. The meal is delicious, but the silence and lack of conversation is frustrating and only serves as a counterpoint to the days when he camped with friends. It only underscores the fact that he is no longer among friends. They are acquaintances, at best.

"Hey Cor?" he asks after a long silence. "I never asked. You have kids?"

Cor stares off into the distance. "I did. A daughter. She died when she was three. She'd be about your age now."

"Sorry," Prompto says.

Cor nods. "It couldn't be helped."

They fall into silence again and the only sound is the crickets and the crackle of the fire.

He has a dozen and a half questions, but he can ask none of them.

* * *

They're up and on their way before dawn, loaded down with weapons and curatives, and they walk to the tower. An eerie light glows through the trees and Prompto shudders at the memory of what lay below ground. He doubts the place is still infested with daemons, but his younger self was still green and inexperienced and he hated every second of his last visit.

Cor signals for them to stop and they take refuge behind a boulder. On the edge of dawn, with the darkness fading, Prompto feels the way he did back then. No one has died to bring back the daylight, but that old panic leaves his limbs weak and his heart full of fear.

Aranea climbs the boulder and lays down on her stomach to peer at the landscape through binoculars. Prompto waits for someone to say something. To explain. To give an order. To break the silence and the hold the past still has on him.

"Cor," Aranea says and motions for him to join her.

Cor looks and they exchange a glance before they both turn their gaze to Prompto.

"What?" he asks.

"Best you see for yourself," Cor says as he climbs down. "I'm going to scout the area."

Prompto takes his place and lays on the cool rock, shoulder to shoulder with Aranea. Through the lenses of the binoculars, Prompto sees not an MT army assembled and awaiting command, but a sea of broken parts and armor and bones. Hundreds upon hundreds of fallen MT's, rusting and rotting in the sun.

It's a graveyard.

His throat gets tight, but he breathes a sigh of relief that they probably won't need to fight.

"So we came all this way for nothing?" he says.

"I wouldn't say for nothing," Aranea says. "Look."

She points to the left and Prompto focuses in on a lone MT, still alive, still moving, and carrying a rock in one hand and a tin can in another. Though part human, it doesn't move like one. It's shed its outer lightproof shell and looks more human than robot. It sits in an ungainly heap in the grass and smashes the rock against one end of the can. Once, twice, three times, until the side of the can buckles.

It peels the broken can open and places the torn edge against its lips and begins to drink whatever is inside.

Prompto is sickened, not by the MT itself, but by its helplessness. No one ever taught it to open a tin can. No one ever taught it how to take care of itself. Yet somehow, it has managed.

He watches it finish its meal, and he watches it stand and move across the field scattered with the remains of its brothers. Every now and then, it stops, bends down, and touches bones or armor in an almost loving way.

Prompto's eyes burn. It isn't right.

"We should put it out of its misery," Aranea says. "That's pathetic."

Prompto can't disagree, but he's not sure if he can justify killing it. He's even less sure when it kneels down beside a fallen MT and assumes a posture Prompto can only call one of mourning. If it can grieve, it's as human as he is.

"Listen, Shortcake, we've been over this," she says.

"I'm not doing it."

"Fine," she says. "I'll do it myself."

She snatches his rifle from his shoulder, lightning quick, and takes aim. Prompto seizes the barrel and points it toward the sky as she pulls the trigger. Heat burns through his gloves and his ears ring, but he's determined to stop her for reasons he doesn't quite understand himself.

"Let go!" she says. "You're not doing it any favors by keeping it alive."

Something collides with both of them, and Aranea is sent to the ground. She lands hard and gives a grunt of pain, and Prompto pushes to his knees to confront whatever hit them.

He expects a monster or an MT, and it takes him several seconds to process what he's looking at, even if the face looking back at him is so familiar he'd have to be blind not to recognize himself in it.

"No kill."

Prompto stares at the freckled cheeks and the patchy, fuzzy, almost-beard, and the dirty straw-blond strands that frame the boy's face.

They're all supposed to be dead. Unlike the MT's, the undeveloped ones were destroyed. Or so he thought. The boy before him is proof otherwise.

The young man grabs Prompto's wrist and flicks his eyes to the bar code, then shows Prompto his own.

The numbered sequence beneath it indicates his doppelganger is only seventeen, meaning he was only two when the lab went up in smoke. How that can be is a question Prompto can't answer.

At the telltale click of a chambered round, Prompto turns to face Aranea. He has no choice but to act. He scrambles over the side of the boulder and tackles her to the ground and wrestles for control of the weapon.

"I'm not going to let you do this," he says.

Aranea bashes the butt of the rifle against Prompto's jaw. He recoils from the blow, the side of his face lit up like fire, but he throws himself forward and keeps fighting. Aranea is strong and stubborn, but Prompto is determined to protect his other self, even if that other self could be just as merciless as the MT he was meant to become. If that's the case, Prompto will handle it. Until then, he'll put himself in the path of a bullet rather than let her shoot first and ask questions later.

They grapple in the dirt until he pries the gun away from her and she freezes on the ground beneath him. He can't tell if she's pissed or if she doesn't care.

"Don't fight me."

She blinks at him, her palms upturned toward the sky.

"Your funeral."

Prompto stands up just as Cor rounds the bend. An MT follows him, dragging the carcass of a goat by the leg. Prompto lifts his rifle, just in case, but the MT is focused on his prize and appears unarmed.

"Hold your fire, Prompto," Cor says. "They have no will to fight."

"What's with the goat?" Prompto asks as he lowers his weapon.

"I can hardly believe it, but if I'm reading him right, he's offered to share his lunch with us."

It's then that Cor spies the younger Prompto crouched beside the boulder.

"You didn't know about this?" Prompto demands.

"No," Cor says quietly. "I didn't know."

Prompto doesn't want to believe him, but if Cor is lying, he deserves an award. He stares at the wide-eyed boy like he's looking at a ghost.

Aranea gets up and dusts herself off, unusually silent.

"What about you? Did you know?"

"If I did, I sure as hell wouldn't have brought you along," she says. "We should take care of this, Cor. If we let them live, they'll end up like all the rest."

She tips her head at the field of parts and bones, and Prompto fears she's not wrong. Left on their own, they will die but he can't bring himself to agree.

"We're not going to kill them."

"Then what do you propose we do?" Aranea says. "Let them be? What do you do with a lame chocobo? One that's too injured to stand on its own?"

Prompto clenches his teeth. The two in the field do not seem to be in any distress. The boy, though dirty, looks healthy and strong.

"They don't look lame to me," Prompto fires back.

"They're ticking time bombs," she says. "They need to be dealt with."

He shakes his head and turns away. He gets where she's coming from, but when people get sick and can't care for themselves, no one ever suggests they be put down. There's evidence enough the ones that survive are capable of human emotions. They have a will to live, and as far as he can tell, they want to live in peace. He can't justify killing them just because they are not normal people.

"They're just trying to survive. Just like everyone else."

"They're not just like everyone else."

He flashes his barcode.

"Neither am I."

That shuts her up and Prompto returns his attention to the boy. Cor crouches down before him and eyes him with pity.

"No kill," the other Prompto chants. "No kill."

"You can speak," Cor says. "Do you have a name?"

It's eerie, this carbon copy of his seventeen-year-old self, the bridge of his nose still perfectly straight, his face unblemished and free of scars.

Was he ever really so young? Did he really look that innocent?

"...Salvus."

"Salvus," Prompto repeats. "That's a good name. It means survival, right?"

"Something closer to salvation, I think," Cor says. "Do you understand what we're saying?"

Salvus' eyes flick from one to the other and he nods. "Yes."

Prompto sits cross-legged in the grass next to Cor. He wants the boy to see him not as a threat, but an ally.

"How did you get here?" he asks.

Salvus struggles to find the right words. His eyelids flutter and his forehead wrinkles in concentration, and he points to his bare feet.

"You walked?"

"Walked," Salvus agrees, then mimes what Prompto assumes is swimming. "Ch-ch-ch-ch."

"You took a train?"

"Yes," he says with a big smile. "Ch-ch-ch-ch. Woooo!"

Prompto is surprised into a laugh, and he exchanges a glance with Cor as the boy begins to flap his arms like a bird, then points to the sky.

The MT with the goat has begun to strip away the skin from the meat, and uses a crude knife fashioned from a sharp piece of metal.

"Can they speak?" Prompto asks. "The MT's?"

He points to his throat and shakes his head.

"They're mute," Cor says. "As far as I know."

Prompto's pity for them only increases. The Nifs took everything from them. They never even had a chance to be anything more than what they were created to be. True, they might take life without mercy or regrets, and he wouldn't hesitate to shoot if they became hostile, but there's still a part of Prompto that empathizes.

"Can they understand?"

"Yes," Salvus says. His eyes grow sad as he looks at the MT. "Feet. Stop."

He points to the remains of the others and shakes his head.

Prompto shudders. Cor places a hand on his shoulder and squeezes.

"They're dying?"

"Yes. Dying."

Salvus jumps to his feet and tugs on Prompto's wrist. Prompto stands and lets Salvus lead him into the ruins of the tower, where several more MT's are gathered. On the right, a trio of them play a crude game involving twigs and a circle drawn in the dirt, the goal similar to a child's game of pick-up-sticks.

On the left, four more lay on their sides, alive but with vacant or pained expressions on their faces. All have removed their lightproof armor. What skin is visible can only be described as sickly. Their time grows short, and some of them, at least, are suffering.

"Still think I'm wrong?" Aranea asks.

Prompto can't answer that question.

* * *

Cindy makes the drive to Old Lestallum in the Grease Monkey with the top down and the wind in her hair. It's been a while since she's left Hammerhead on her own, other than to drag some stranded motorist out of a ditch, so long, she almost forgot how much she enjoys driving by herself.

The car is fast and handles like a dream. A lot of love went into rebuilding her, but it was love that brought the car into her possession in the first place. The old girl isn't just a car, it's a symbol of something more profound, the collision of two things that make her happy and just driving it makes her heart soar.

Cindy never wanted a man to stay long term, and she certainly never pictured herself wanting to marry any of the others, but she realizes now that it's because none of them added anything to her life. Not one of them made her life better or easier. To them, she was a trophy, a conquest, a prize, a bragging right. Nothing more.

There's no question this is what she wants. It's not that Prompto wore her down, or that she gave in to make him happy, nor is it because Cid made her feel guilty. It's that she doesn't have to make compromises for their relationship to work. He's never asked her to give up anything or told her to stop working so hard, and he never throws tantrums when she's too busy to pay attention. It's that he gives so much without expecting anything in return.

More than that, they are friends. That foundation of trust is something that was missing from every other relationship in her past. She can tell him anything, she can cry in front of him, and know he won't laugh or walk away and let her deal with it on her own.

It's because of this she's happy to marry him and do the domestic things she never thought she'd do. It doesn't feel like she'll lose a part of herself in the process, or that she's about to sacrifice her happiness for the sake of his.

Cid told her a long time ago if she ever decided to settle down, not to go for the exciting one, but her best friend. The kind of love lasts, he said. It sees you through the dark times. Cindy thought back then it was his way of warning her away from the bad boy types, but now she sees how right he was.

She pulls into a parking spot just outside a two-story building in Old Lestallum and peers up at the faded yellow facade. There's still evidence here of the ruin, but down the street, the Crow's Nest is open and it stands out among the battered buildings with its repaired and freshly repainted Kenny Crow perched atop the awning.

She loved that radio spot as a kid and once pestered Cid to visit the location in Leide until he gave in. They drove out in the tow truck and ate salmon and fries until they were fit to burst. He let her play the pinball machine for an hour and took her picture on the bench next to Kenny.

Cindy smiles at the memory but her heart hurts. She misses him and regrets that she didn't spend more time with him at the end.

It reminds her why she's here, sitting in front of a battered building in Old Lestallum.

Inside the building, the carpet is threadbare and smells of mold. The striped wallpaper bubbles and peels. Not an ideal place for a dying woman or her children.

Megan, age eight, was born during the ruin. Mia came two months after it ended. Cindy has never met either.

It's the girls who answer the door. Mia's got green eyes the same shade as Cindy's. Megan's are hazel. Both have a head full of dark blond curls and both could use a good scrub and a decent meal.

Cindy wants to be angry at the apparent neglect, but she's willing to bet her cousin Casey has done her best under the circumstances. Not so many people left around these parts, and most are just barely getting by themselves.

"Who are you?" Megan demands. "What do you want?"

"I'm your cousin, Cindy. Your Ma called me, so I came to visit."

"Ma's sick," Mia says. "She pooped herself."

Megan elbows Mia in the ribs and scowls darkly at her sister.

"Don't talk about that," Megan says. "You'll make her cry again."

"Well, let's see what we can do to help her," Cindy says. "And maybe we can all go down to the Crow's Nest and get us a big ole plate of fries later. What do you say?"

Both girls fall silent at the mention of food. On the kitchen table are half a dozen empty Cup Noodles, stacked in a pyramid. Plastic forks litter the placemats.

Megan lets Cindy in, but eyes her like she might fight to the death if she tries anything. Cindy wishes she could hug the child and promise nothing bad will come of her visit, but she can't promise that until she knows how bad off Casey really is.

It's worse than Cindy imagined. Casey is little more than a bag of bones, her eyes are huge but sunken, and her hair is thinned and brittle as straw. She looks worse than Cid did on his last day, and Cindy knows the end is close.

"Cindy," Casey rasps and pats the mattress beside her. "Girls, go play. I need to talk to your cousin."

Megan stares at her mother with a dark frown, then takes Mia by the arm and leads her from the room. Cindy watches them go because she's afraid to look at Casey.

Casey struggles to sit up and Cindy helps. Propped up by pillows, Casey's frailty is even more apparent.

"I ain't got much time," she says. "Maybe a day or two. Doctor says everything's just shutting down."

"I'm sorry," Cindy says because she doesn't know what else to say.

"Ain't your fault," Casey says. "I know it's a lot to ask, seein' as we don't know each other, but the girls gotta get looked after, and I don't know who else to ask. Better if they're with family. S'pose you understand that better'n most."

Casey's face crumples and tears spill over her sallow cheeks. Cindy brushes away her tears and does her best to offer comfort.

"I wish you'd called me sooner," Cindy says. "You didn't have to do this all alone, you know."

"Well, Sophiar's are stubborn fools," Casey says. "I suspect you already know that."

"Don't I?" Cindy agrees. "Still, I wish I coulda helped more."

"Coulda shoulda woulda," Casey says. "My own damn fault. You let me shoulder that blame. Never been good about stayin' in touch."

Cindy regrets not reaching out herself. They were only girls when the met the first time, and she never really thought much about Casey afterward. Cid may have mentioned her a time or two over the years, but not often. Between war and Cindy's narrow focus, it didn't occur to her to acquaint herself with what little family she had left.

"I promise, they'll be in good hands," Cindy says. "I don't know nothin' about kids, but I'll do my best."

"I know it's a lot to ask."

"Least I can do to make up for it," Cindy says. "They ain't gonna go without."

* * *

There are thirteen living MT's in total. Six of them are not long for this world. As Prompto follows a wide-eyed and enthusiastic Salvus around, he sees what a burden being self-aware must be for the ones that are left. He finds artfully arranged parts and armor like cemetery markers all over the place and watches a couple MT's bend down and touch the remains of another with what can what only be sorrow or maybe a show of respect.

They mourn their dead. They work together to find food. They play games for entertainment. They can't speak, but they communicate through hand signals and gestures.

Prompto is left speechless more than once, and he sheds a tear or two every time he sees something of himself in them. If left alone, untouched by technology or darkness, the might be very much like him. Perhaps their experiences would shape their personalities and interests, and maybe some of them would have turned out more like their creator than Prompto did, but he knows every last one was robbed of the life they should have gotten a chance to live.

Cor and Aranea hang back and let him explore and interact with his siblings. He has no fear they will attack or try to kill him. They're mostly curious and touch his hair and his face and the brand on his arm, and once he's used to it, he welcomes it.

Salvus leads him behind the ruins, into the trees to show him a memorial built from parts of their lost brothers. It stands seven feet tall, a recreation of an MT with angel wings made from bones and bird feathers. Prompto kneels before it, a hand pressed to his mouth as Salvus scouts the area for wildflowers to lay at the statue's feet.

"Did you make this?" Prompto asks.

"Yes."

"This is awesome," he says, and he means it. The statue is crude and maybe a little creepy, but it's clear what it's supposed to be. "You've got talent, kid."

Salvus grins and touches the tips of the bird feathers on one wing. He's proud of his work. Prompto returns the smile and ruffles Salvus' hair.

"I make stuff like this, too," Prompto says. "Not as good as this, though."

They sit in the grass to admire the statue, but Prompto can't help but wonder how Salvus escaped the lab. He must've had help. Someone must have saved him. Someone taught him to speak and survive.

"Dying," Salvus says and touches the rifle slung across Prompto's back. "Help."

"You're dying?" he asks.

Salvus shakes his head and points to the metal and bone statue.

"Them."

Prompto swallows around the lump in his throat and struggles to find the right words.

"You want me to help them die?" he finally asks.

Salvus nods, and Prompto's heart shatters. Whatever brought Salvus here and whatever experiences he's had so far outside the lab, and however childlike he seems, he is intelligent enough to understand that they're suffering.

"Please."

"What about you?" Prompto asks. "What happens to you?"

Salvus touches Prompto's marked wrist again.

"Family."

Prompto blinks at him. His eyes sting and his heart hurts. His own family never cared. His adopted brothers left him behind. For as much as he loves Cindy, for as happy as she makes him, there is still a part of his heart that is missing pieces. He longs for family, too.

"Brother," Salvus says. "Please."

"You're not going to kill me in my sleep, are you?" Prompto asks with a nervous laugh.

Salvus looks offended and shakes his head violently. He places a hand to his chest, as if to say not ever, not ever.

"No kill."

"Sorry. Had to ask," Prompto says. "So, you want to come home with me?"

Salvus nods.

Prompto takes only a second to make up his mind.

"Okay," he says. "We'll go home."

* * *

As the sun goes down, Cindy walks the girls, both freshly bathed, to the Crow's Nest. She lets them order what they want, along with milkshakes and pie. They eat like they haven't been fed in weeks, though she knows this isn't true, judging from the stockpile of convenience foods in the pantry.

Megan is quiet and wary, but Mia chatters on about her imaginary friend Patsy and tells Cindy someday she wants to get a dog, a cat, and a chocobo.

Near the end of the meal, Megan pushes her half-finished burger away.

"Mom's dying," she says.

"I'm afraid so."

Next to Megan, Mia's eyes fill with tears.

"Told you," Megan says.

"I'm real sorry about that," Cindy says. "But I know what it's like. I was about your age when my parents passed. 'Cept I didn't get no warning."

"What happens to us?" Megan asks. "When she's gone?"

"Well, you'll come live with me in Leide," Cindy says.

"You don't even know us."

"I know, and I'm real sorry about that," Cindy says, "but I think you'll like it there."

"Do you have chocobos?" Mia asks.

"No, it's too hot for chocobos most of the time," Cindy says. "They visit sometimes, though."

"Can we see them when they come?"

"Sure," Cindy says.

"Do you have a husband?"

"Well, not yet, but I'm getting' married real soon," Cindy says. "Maybe you girls can be in the weddin'."

"Can we?" Mia asks, her tears forgotten. "Can I be a flower girl?"

"Sure you can," Cindy says. "I'd like that. Megan, maybe you can be a bridesmaid? I only got one so far."

Megan shrugs. "I guess."

She sips her milkshake and watches Cindy. Already, she's mourning her mother, old enough to understand the end is coming soon. Cindy takes her hand and gives it a squeeze, and the girl stoicism breaks. She bursts in to tears, her sobs quiet but violent, and Cindy moves to sit beside her.

"I don't want her to leave," Megan breathes.

"I know, sweetheart," Cindy says. "I know."

She doesn't tell them it will be okay, because it won't. Not for a while. She remembers all too well what it was like, losing her parents. For a long time, she was angry. She acted out, took it out on Paw-paw, threw tantrums and ran away twice. He did his best to deal with it, and he wasn't always patient, but he did a great job, and he never stopped loving her, even when she forced him to be tough.

Cindy cries with the girls, the three of them tangled together on one side of the booth. Other patrons of the restaurant stare or frown at the commotion, but Cindy ignores them.

Megan's outburst doesn't last long. She stops crying and stares at her lap, at the crumpled napkin in her fist. Mia crawls into Cindy's lap and clings to her.

"Momma says you have cars," Mia says.

"I got a couple," Cindy says. "And a big ole tow truck."

Mia blinks at her. "Is it for your feet?"

Cindy laughs and smooths down Mia's hair.

"It's to move broke-down cars," Cindy says. "It's big and ugly and loud."

"Can I ride in it?"

"Of course you can," Cindy says. She surveys the table. "You ladies ready to go?"

They are. Cindy pays the bill, and Mia latches onto Cindy's hand, but Megan keeps to herself as they walk back to the apartment.

By the time they get there, Casey has passed on.


End file.
